A/HRC/53/39 protection, labour relations and fiscal accountability. 107 Several recent guidance documents have been developed to highlight the responsibilities of businesses to ensure that their activities advance the right to substantive gender equality.108 In practice, participants in the Working Group’s consultations noted that businesses were routinely failing to pay living or equal wages, or to offer social security, including paid maternity or carers’ leave, that many were not taking adequate steps to guarantee sexual and reproductive health and other rights of workers to bodily autonomy and freedom from violence, or to ensure women’s rights to collective bargaining and freedom of association. It was also emphasized that corporate due diligence procedures and grievance mechanisms for business-related human rights abuse were not gender-sensitive, let alone gender-transformative, and, as a result, were largely ineffective in changing discriminatory norms and practices. 109 III. Conclusions and recommendations A. Conclusions 58. Too little attention has been paid to the reduction of socioeconomic inequalities as a prerequisite for effective action to combat poverty. The international human rights framework provides tools to measure and understand how the rights of women and girls to live free from poverty and inequality are being systematically violated by particular political, social, cultural and economic norms and institutions. Human rights instruments also contain important redistributive and solidarity obligations that, if fully implemented, would enable States as well as other duty bearers to create sustainable, feminist and human rights-based economies. 59. A feminist and human rights-based approach to poverty and inequality is based on the assertion that the role of the economy is to support human dignity, well-being and human rights. A feminist human rights framework focusing on women’s human rights, especially their economic, social and cultural rights and their right to participate in all spheres of life, allows specific forms of structural discrimination to be redressed. This entails examining wealth and income distribution, intra-household dynamics, access to and control over assets, including those that are held in common, environmental protection, time allocation, care and well-being, and the right to rest and leisure of women and girls, as pivotal elements of gender equality and sustainable development. This approach also draws attention to the responsibilities of States and other actors to take targeted steps to address inequalities in the distribution of power, resources and entitlements and to advance collective and individual human rights, including the right to development. The adoption of human rights-based and feminist perspectives by States and international organizations to enable the creation of progressive, redistributive global financial governance frameworks is essential for addressing both inequalities and poverty in a comprehensive and effective manner. 60. The right to live free from poverty and not to be discriminated against on the basis of socioeconomic condition should be further developed as key human rights, and appropriate systems should be established to collect disaggregated data on the multiple dimensions of inequalities and poverty. Identifying and effectively responding to intersecting and multiple forms of inequality on the grounds of poverty, sex and gender, race, ethnicity, age, ability, religion, geographical location, migration status, sexual orientation, gender identity and other conditions must be a priority for participatory and targeted policies and strategies at the local, national, regional and international levels. 107 108 109 GE.23-06173 ESCAP, “Business initiatives to reduce poverty and inequality: strengthening the evidence base to leave no one behind” (2021). A/HRC/41/49; A/HRC/41/43; and OHCHR, “Tackling discrimination against lesbian, gay, bi, trans & intersex people: standards of conduct for business”, November 2017. See A/HRC/41/43. 17