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Take the incidence of blindness in the world today. Four out of five blind people live in the third world and four out of five of them are preventably blind—this

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at a time when the cost of saving people from disability has been falling as dramatically as the incidence of preventable disability in many of the poorest countries has increased. That is but one example of the scale of the problems that the UN convention has to address and RI’s Charter for the Third Millennium provides as good a guide as now exists to the way forward. It is a statement not of generalisations, but of well argued recommendations that include many about the contribution that aid-giving countries can make to helping disabled people in the third world: for example, the recommendation to ensure that international assistance programmes require accessibility for disabled people in all infrastructure projects, including technology and communications, to vouchsafe their full inclusion in the economic and social life of their communities.

Yet inevitably disability organisations in the developed world also want to see progress in rooting out discriminatory practices in their own communities; and many of the Parliamentary Questions that I have asked since our signing of the convention have reflected concerns put to me by representative disabled people in the UK. They are anxious to know what progress Ministers have made in analysing the compatibility of the convention with British laws, their plans for ratification and whether we shall sign the Optional Protocol about which I asked a recent Starred Question. They also want to know how widely the Government will consult disabled people and their organisations in implementing the convention, monitoring its impact and promoting its purpose. I am asked in particular whether Ministers will consult the RNIB, the RNID, Leonard Cheshire and CEHR; and I know that my noble friend Lord McKenzie of Luton will respond as fully and helpfully as he can to these questions.

The endeavours of disability organisations to make Britain the exemplar par excellence of full and rapid implementation of the convention richly deserve to succeed, because it was from here that the long, long trail towards achieving equal rights for disabled people began. It did so in 1978, when Sir Peter Large was appointed to head a government committee of inquiry—of which the noble Lord, Lord Low, was also a member—into unjustified discrimination against disabled people. Its landmark report in 1982 called for legislation to outlaw such discrimination.

The Americans with Disabilities Act was but one lineal descendant of that report, followed by legislation here and in many other countries and culminating now in the UN convention. That is why this debate should not end without due acknowledgement of Peter Large’s huge contribution to that outcome. Severely disabled himself, often having to rely on an iron lung to stay alive, he was a towering figure in the world of disability whose passing two years ago was an immense loss to disabled people everywhere. We owe it to them—not least, in UNICEF's words, the poorest and least politically influential people on earth—and to Peter's memory, to brook no delay in implementing the UN convention.

6.58 pm

Lord Low of Dalston: My Lords, I join other noble Lords in congratulating the noble Lord, Lord Ashley, on having secured this timely debate. In following him,

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it is a pleasure to acknowledge the inspiration that he has given the rest of us, over many years, in the struggle for disabled people's rights. I pay tribute also to the noble Lord, Lord Morris of Manchester, whose work in this field is universally recognised and has been seminal. After all, his work on Rehabilitation International's Charter for the Third Millennium was, in many ways, the origin of the call for a UN convention. It is indeed a privilege to follow both those noble Lords in the debate.

I begin by declaring my interest. As an officer of the World Blind Union, I played a small part in the negotiations in New York back in 2002 towards the beginning of the process. Since then, both as chairman of RNIB and president of the European Blind Union, I have followed the process closely. Like other noble Lords, I welcome the adoption of this convention. I readily acknowledge the positive and constructive part that the UK Government, and in particular Anne McGuire MP, the Minister in another place, have played in the negotiations. By signing the convention on the first day it was open for signature, the Government have set a positive example to other countries to get a move on with the ratification process. Like other noble Lords, I hope the Government will be in a position to ratify the convention soon, with as few derogations and reservations as possible. I shall be interested to hear how long the pre-ratification review of UK legislation is likely to take and when the UK thinks it will be able to sign the optional protocol. However, it is about the rights themselves that I principally wish to speak this evening.

Her Majesty’s Government may conclude that the UK is ahead of most other countries in the matter of discrimination legislation, and they may be right to do so, but I would not want them to conclude from that that they can safely rest on their laurels and carry on as if it was business as usual. I believe that there are clear areas where the convention calls for Governments to provide services or take action over and above what is currently to be found in UK legislation or practice. It also seems that despite the increased emphasis on rights in UK legislation in recent years, in some areas there has actually been a deterioration in the level of support needed to ensure that these rights can be fully enjoyed, notably in the field of social care where 70 per cent of local councils have already indicated that they will be able to meet only the needs of those who fall into the critical or substantial category; and that figure of 70 per cent is set to rise to 80 per cent in the next year. I shall give three examples of where the convention requirements do not seem to me to be properly met at present for visually impaired people in the UK.

Article 26, on habilitation and rehabilitation, says:

However, recent research by Guide Dogs found that 20 per cent of those surveyed had not received any form of needs assessment; only 56 per cent of those who had had their needs assessed were offered services based on that assessment; and only 37 per cent had received training in mobility.



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Again, the Equipped for Living report produced last year by the Improving Lives Coalition, a consortium of voluntary sector bodies concerned with improving social services for visually impaired people, based on a survey of 500 people in England and Wales, found that blind and partially sighted people were receiving very little in the way of equipment to help with independent living. For example, computer equipment using large-text speech or Braille was available to only 14 per cent of people, and four out of five of them had to buy it for themselves. This small selection of data from these two surveys illustrates the extremely poor state of rehabilitation services for blind and partially sighted people in the UK today.

Article 21, on freedom of expression and opinion and access to information, says that states parties should provide,

Yet in the area of health services alone a recent survey of blind and partially sighted people in the UK showed that 95 per cent of respondents had never received health advice leaflets or information from their local surgery in their preferred format; 96 per cent had never received letters from their GP, results of tests or other correspondence in their preferred format; and 95 per cent had never received medicine labelled in large print.

Article 9, on accessibility, says that states parties shall, among other things,

Yet still almost no buses in the UK currently have onboard announcements on route destination or next stop, and according to the Guide Dog research mentioned earlier, only 39 per cent travelled by bus and 11 per cent by train.

In the light of the above and other areas I could mention, I should like to ask the Minister three questions. First, will the current exercise to review UK legislation in the light of the convention be used to identify areas where further action needs to be taken? Secondly, what steps will the Government take to ensure that statutory bodies such as local councils implement the requirements of the convention? Thirdly, will the Government ensure that they involve disabled people from all walks of life and their organisations, both large and small, when carrying out this work? If you go to the Directgov web page on international disability rights and the UN convention and look under:

you will find links to just two disability organisation websites—that of the representative of disabled people on the UK’s delegation to the convention negotiations in New York and that of Disability Awareness in Action, a small pressure group concerned with monitoring infringements of disabled people’s rights and promoting action to address them. I am sure that the Minister will agree with me—as he did when answering my supplementary question of 16 January—about the

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importance of implementing the convention rights in a manner which takes account of the diversity of disabled people’s needs and ensures that in the implementation and monitoring process the Government consult with as wide a range of organisations as possible.

The UN convention will be the first human rights treaty to be ratified by the European Union. It therefore involves obligations not just for the UK but for the EU as well in areas where it has competence. The principles of non-discrimination and equality are among the underlying principles in the convention and are at the heart of many of its specific articles, for example those on accessibility. Given that the EU now has competence to address disability discrimination since Article 13 of the Amsterdam treaty, and has already used this competence with regard to discrimination in employment, following the UN convention it should now take the next step, as the noble Baroness, Lady Darcy de Knayth, said, and adopt a general disability directive covering all the areas falling within its competence such as access to goods and services, transport and manufactured goods. The last of these is particularly important since under single market legislation it cannot be addressed by national legislation. Furthermore, the UK, as the EU member state with the longest experience of disability discrimination legislation, should take the lead in persuading the Commission to propose such legislation.

To conclude, I believe that the convention is to be welcomed but we should welcome it with our eyes open. Many of the rights in it are as long as a piece of string. Phrases such as “as far as possible”, “to the greatest extent possible” and “all appropriate measures” abound. I commend the initiative of the European Blind Union, of which, as I say, I am president, to spell out in detail what the various rights mean for blind and partially sighted people. I hope very much that the Government will want to enter into discussion with our UK affiliates on this.

7.08 pm

Baroness Wilkins: My Lords, as is repeatedly the case, I add my thanks to my noble friend Lord Ashley of Stoke for securing this debate and for his relentless pressure on the Government to secure the human rights of all disabled people. I also add my thanks to the Minister, Anne McGuire, and her predecessor, Maria Eagle, together with their official, Liz Tillett, for their commitment in bringing the UN convention into existence. Most important, I pay tribute to Rachel Hurst of Disability Awareness in Action and Richard Light for their years and years of tireless work in producing the evidence, arguing the case and lobbying for the need for a UN convention to protect the rights of the 650 million disabled people throughout the world.

Our Government can be proud of their role in developing this UN convention and for being one of its earliest signatories. With this history, will my noble friend the Minister tell the House what justification there can possibly be why we should not be high on the list of the 20 nations needed to ratify the convention and so ensure that it becomes binding on all UN countries?



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Other noble Lords have addressed the breadth of this debate, so I hope that they will understand if I concentrate on just one area, which I consider fundamental to meeting disabled people’s human rights. David Orr, chief executive of the National Housing Federation, said at this year’s EU seminar on housing as a human right:

At the European level, there is growing acceptance that human rights must be the basis for social policy. Scotland was the first place in Europe to make the right to housing enforceable by law, and last Christmas France followed its example. The DRC has called on the Government to use their leverage to ensure that the newly formed fundamental rights agency conducts research and gathers data on the rights of disabled people across the European Union, which I totally endorse.

Public discussion of housing in the last few years is as likely to talk of “investment opportunity” as recognise that our home is the very foundation of our social and psychological well-being. It is the base that should enable us to take our place in the world around us, healthy, rested, clean and ready to use our talents. Yet home for many disabled people is neither liberating nor comforting. Too often it is the bare four walls, with a bed, table and cupboard, of a residential care home; or where your bed and commode are in the family sitting room, as the only accessible space. It can be the place that is impossible to leave because of the flights of stairs to the outside world, or where the damp walls provide a daily threat to your asthma and thus your life. A disabled person’s home conditions every aspect of their life—their health, ability to work and economic status, social opportunities, ability to contribute and whole well-being.

In Britain, we have a housing crisis which impacts disproportionately on disabled people due to their relative poverty and restricted opportunities. The facts are worth repeating. In 2003, the charity John Grooms conducted a survey of physically disabled people across England and Wales. It found that more than 20 per cent of respondents lived in houses that were either difficult to move around or to get in and out of, that 40 per cent of respondents felt that their housing situation made them unnecessarily dependent on other people, and that 24 per cent of wheelchair users were prisoners in their own home because of poor access and location.

What measures are the Government taking to meet Article 9 of the UN convention, which calls for measures to,

It calls on states to take appropriate measures to ensure that disabled people have equal access to the physical environment, including accessible housing.

Yesterday’s statement by the incoming Prime Minister that,



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and that the Housing Minister will sit in Cabinet could not be more welcome. He went on to say that,

I ask my noble friend to ensure that the new Housing Minister is aware that disabled people’s needs must be integral to that policy if our human rights are to be met and disabled people are to have any hope of taking an equal part in society.

It is not enough just to build more houses, although more are undoubtedly required. That new housing stock needs to be fully accessible and adaptable. The building industry will continue to ignore that need unless it is forced to act, and to date the Government have refused to require all new housing to meet the lifetime home standard. Merely making it a recommendation is not enough to get developers to act. Furthermore, the shortage of accessible housing is an issue that the Barker review completely ignored, and there is no coherent government strategy to tackle it.

The Government have cause to be immensely proud of their part in bringing the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities into existence. As the DRC says, the fact that we were one of the first signatories sent a strong signal of support for making human rights a reality for disabled people. The right to a secure, warm, dry and accessible home is one of the most basic of those rights. I hope that my noble friend the Minister can assure the House that the Government will soon set out their policy to meet Article 9 and that they will ratify the convention at the earliest possible date, with—as the noble Lord, Lord Low, said—as few derogations or reservations as possible.

7.15 pm

Baroness Masham of Ilton: My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Ashley of Stoke, for asking Her Majesty’s Government what action they are taking to promote the United Nations convention on disability rights. I have the greatest admiration for the noble Lord for his continued dedication and campaigning on behalf of disabled people. This is a good debate, because so many faithful campaigners for disability in your Lordships’ House are taking part.

Until they become disabled, or a member of their family does, members of the general public have no idea what disability in so many different forms really means and how many obstacles there are when living in the community. Many countries throughout the world still look to the UK for leadership in many fields. If we promote this convention, I am sure that it will help many disabled people across the world. I remember visiting a church while on holiday with my husband in Italy. A young couple were sitting in the church; the young woman was disabled, and they asked us whether we were married. When we told them that we were, they were so pleased and said that meeting us had given them encouragement as they wanted to get married but faced opposition from family and officials.



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Disabled people often have to battle for many things in life that non-disabled people take for granted. This is why we need this convention. There are many things that we must improve in our country, including building a human rights culture by rolling out human rights training for all public servants.

I shall relate an incident that could be typical in this country for disabled people. I declare an interest as a disabled driver. In Northallerton, which is the small county town of North Yorkshire, there are very few parking places for disabled people. On one recent occasion I had to go to Northallerton to collect some things, and I parked in the one and only parking space in Zetland Street. There was no message covering the disabled parking sign to say that parking for disabled people had been suspended. When I came back with my unfortunate helper, who was carrying packages and pushing me, we found a black bin liner over the sign and a taxi driver saying that they had been allocated the one and only disabled place. What is more, I had a parking ticket. No doubt the local taxi drivers and police had an amicable arrangement. My companion is from the Czech Republic and she was shocked that such blatant discrimination should happen in such a place as Northallerton.

As president of the Spinal Injuries Association, I can say that we have had several members of the police who have become paralysed in the course of their duty and are not aware of what the needs are until it happens to them. Their macho attitudes soon change when they become disabled. That is one section of public servants who definitely need training. Members of Parliament should also be aware of what happens in their constituencies. When that incident happened to me, most of the High Street was closed because of the Spring Fair, which made it even more difficult to park. It would be even more important if a disabled person had wanted to take children to the fair but had nowhere to park. That is typical of the cutting of services to the most needy.

How has there been a ruling in the House of Lords that the Human Rights Act does not apply to people who are in independent care homes when their care is paid for by the local authority or the NHS? I hope that the Minister will be able to explain that anomaly. I hope that the Government will act quickly to close that loophole, which leaves disabled people in private or voluntary sector care homes without the protection of the Human Rights Act. As has often been said in your Lordships’ House, those are very vulnerable people who need protection.

We have just voted to protect prisoners under the Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Bill. They should be protected. I voted for it. But so should all disabled people be protected. Sometimes, it has been found that frail, elderly and disabled people in care homes, as highlighted by a recent “Panorama” programme, have been less protected than people in prison. It is time that that was put right.

7.21 pm

Lord Addington: My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Ashley of Stoke, again gathers together what I have referred to, slightly flippantly, as the usual suspects.

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He brings forward a group of people who, under his leadership and that of the noble Lord, Lord Morris, have been snapping away at the heels of the Government for a long time. That is probably a great reminder that if you want to achieve anything in politics, you have to be not only good but persistent, first and foremost. The Government have learnt that this group is persistent. It briefs well; it gets its message out there. So when we refer to the fact that we want the convention ratified, we are talking about a group that says to the Government, “Please continually bear us in mind, we will not go away”.


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