A/HRC/4/18 page 30 Q8. How have women’s rights to adequate housing and access to related services been addressed in violence against women legislation and programmes in your country? Q9. Please share positive examples or “best practices” whereby Governments and civil society have endeavoured, separately or jointly, to protect and promote women’s equal right to adequate housing. Q10. Please provide gender-disaggregated statistics on housing (urban/rural, forms of ownership, female-headed households, homelessness, access to basic services, etc.). Questions on specific elements of the right to adequate housing (a) Legal security of tenure. The legal right to secure tenure, whether freehold, leasehold, or other form of individual and collective rights to housing, involves protection from forced eviction, harassment and other threats. It also effectively guarantees access to, use of and control over land, property and housing resources. Q11. Do women and men enjoy equal tenure and property rights regardless of their civil or other status? Has lack of secure tenure contributed to situations of VAW? How does the Government guarantee such security of tenure to women? What measures have been adopted to give full protection against forced eviction, based upon effective participation, consultation and negotiation with affected persons or groups? (b) Access to public goods and services. The right to adequate housing cannot be effectively realized without access to public goods and services, including water, health care, transport, fuel, sanitation, lighting and electricity, sewerage and waste disposal, childcare and communications. Q12. What policies and measures have been adopted by the Government to provide or regulate such services to meet the needs of the community? Do women and female-headed households enjoy equal access to such services? Are the basic services privatized? If so, are there subsidies and/or different pricing mechanisms designed to ensure affordable access by the poor? (c) Access to land, water and other natural resources. Every community must have access to natural resources necessary for its survival and livelihood, including, inter alia, fuel, fodder, water and building materials. Q13. What are the laws, policies and measures adopted to ensure equitable distribution of land with emphasis on gender equality and provision of necessary resources for poor households and other marginalized and vulnerable groups? Have land reforms, both urban and rural, been implemented to ensure its fair distribution as a public good? What steps have been taken to respect the housing rights of land-based indigenous and tribal peoples in general and women within these groups in particular?