Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity) | Oireachtas source

I compliment and pay tribute to the campaigners for disability rights who have fought for 11 years for the ratification of the UN Convention of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. We are here today because of their actions and their struggle in putting pressure on successive Governments since 2007, eventually dragging the Irish State to be the final state in the EU to ratify.

As Deputy Gino Kenny mentioned, we should remember that we were told the Disability (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2016 was required for there to be progress on ratification. That Bill has not been fully passed through the Houses, yet here we are, despite what the Government said, ratifying the UNCRPD. I think this is because the eleventh anniversary of the convention going by this month would have proved to be one embarrassment too many for the Government because of the pressure from the outside. More ferocious pressure would have been brought to bear, so it was forced to say, "Okay, we will ratify it". However, we should remember the answers given by this and previous Governments when the Opposition asked, again and again, why it would not ratify. Effectively, they said they did not want to ratify it before they were in a position to give effect to the rights. The Government has now been forced to ratify it without giving effect to the rights but, in turn, that gives a weapon, in a sense, to those campaigners for disability rights to use and to say to the Government, "Now we want our rights as outlined in the convention". That is an important step forward for campaigners.

This links to broader points about the struggle of oppressed groups in recent years to seek recognition and rights, in particular rights to access services in society in general. We have seen inspirational struggles for recognition from the Traveller community, winning the recognition of ethnicity and culture a year ago tomorrow. We have seen trans people winning the ability to be recognised as their true gender, the LGBTQ+ community winning the right to marry if they wish and the deaf community winning recognition of their language, Irish Sign Language. Today, we see the Government finally ratifying the UNCRPD. In all of those cases, the rights were won. They were fought for and only given under pressure, not handed down by the political establishment without significant resistance. It is understood by activists from all of those different communities that, over the past 11 years, Fianna Fáil, the PDs, the Green Party, the Labour Party, Fine Gael and various Independents have all been in power and have resisted ratification for many given reasons and excuses.

The UNCRPD puts forward a rights-based approach for the 600,000 people with disabilities in this State. Those with disabilities deserve to be fully part of society as a right and play an active role in our workplaces, communities, sports clubs, schools and colleges. It is society that must now cater for the needs that different people have. I know that those who fought for the past 11 years for this convention to be ratified know that winning rights on paper means little if they are not backed up by adequate resources, for example, the right to the highest attainable standard of health when there is a right-wing Government making cuts to disability services and to the health service.

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