Mr. Adam Harris:

On some of the barriers on the ground in accessing services, particularly around education services, we can bring it back to the UNCRPD. The UN convention has not been transposed into national law. Implementation requires national law to work and to live out the values of the convention. We have heard about new legislation today but we should not lose sight of the fact that much of the existing disability legislation in Ireland, dating from the late 1990s and the early 2000s, has never been fully commenced. For example, in education, we are looking at the Education of People with Special Education Needs, EPSEN, Act 2004. The non-commencement of that Act is very problematic from the UNCRPD perspective for a few reasons. It means the bulk of supports provided in an education context are on a non-statutory basis. Where the UNCRPD speaks about rights, the supports provided by the State are of a much more grace and favour nature. Furthermore, the non-commencement for such a period means that the Statute Book in many respects around disabilities is significantly out of date. Very specifically around the context of the UNCRPD, if we take the EPSEN Act, its definition of disability does not align with the definition of disability in the UNCRPD in that it seeks to provide an exhaustive list of disability rather than taking a person-centred approach. It also does not recognise the individual lived experience of disability. Critically, it actually provides an exemption around inclusion. It goes so far as to say that we can be inclusive up to a point but there are some people who we just cannot possibly include. There is a real need to look at our domestic Statute Book, commencing and updating its provisions, if we really are to fulfil the values of the UNCRPD.