Dr. Iris Elliott:

With any measures around disabled rights holders, there is a need for the system to be equality and human rights-proofed and to ensure it adheres to the principles of the UNCRPD and all the all other instruments as well. To speak to people in congregated or institutional settings, I appreciate that the committee has been very focused on the optional protocol of the UNCRPD but IHREC is also the designated body for acting as a co-ordinating national preventative mechanism under the optional protocol on the UN Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment. Ireland has not ratified the Optional Protocol against Torture, OPCAT, which again makes it a laggard and an outlier in Europe and globally. The need to frame the experience of people around safeguarding in institutional settings in OPCAT as well as the UNCRPD is really important and we call for the ratification of OPCAT as a matter of urgency through the inspection of places of detention legislation.

The other point I would make around safeguarding is a concern that as has often happened because of the medicalised model predominating around disability, safeguarding is often seen as a health issue and not a cross-cutting issue. I would also encourage the committee to think about safeguarding within a much broader context. The other issue we have raised is that domestic settings for disabled people are often institutional settings and so when we are talking about domestic, sexual and gender-based violence, that often happens in an institutional setting.