Human Rights Bodies joint response to UN report assessing Scottish and UK governments disability rights track record

Speaking in response to the concluding observations of the UN Committee for the rights of persons with disabilities, a spokesperson representing the Scottish Human Rights Commission and Equality Human Rights Commission Scotland said:

 “We are pleased the Scottish Government’s involving of disability groups to help design and implement new policies has been recognised by the UN Committee, but there is a lot more work still to do in Scotland to ensure that disabled people can participate equally in all areas of life.

We have long shared the Committee's concerns about decisions being made for disabled people by others. We welcome the Committee's recommendations for a review of mental capacity and mental health laws in Scotland so that people are supported to make decisions for themselves and that adequate funding is made available to allow disabled people to live independently in the community and to choose where and who they live with.

We stand ready to work with the Government and Disabled People’s Organisations, to ensure that the Committee’s recommendations are taken forward. In particular, we will continue to work with the Scottish Government to ensure the new Scottish social security system has the voices of disabled people reflected in their design as we all strive for a system built on the values of fairness, tolerance, dignity and respect.”

You can view the UN findings here: http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/CRPD/Pages/CRPDIndex.aspx

News on last week’s evidence session can be found here: http://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=21993&LangID=E