Mr. Billy Kelleher:

One of the difficulties we have is a lot of employment rights legislation is still a member state competency. We have had this difficulty in Ireland for many years when it comes to accessibility for people with disabilities to employment, in addition to many other services. We have not adopted and ratified in full the UNCRPD. Other countries have not done so either, but the point is that the legislation which underpins this is primarily a national competency. We have been singularly slow in trying to ensure that services are in place and there are rights and obligations. Even in the Civil Service and the public service, we have failed many times in the context of the number of people with disabilities who are employed in the public service in this country. Accessibility, not just physical accessibility but accessibility to services, is something on which we have a lot of work to do.

The countries that do it best are primarily Nordic. Sweden and Finland, for example, have exceptional systems of rights for people with disabilities. We should just take the good that has been done in those countries in terms of legislation and obligations on employers, for example, the public service, to ensure people with disabilities have access to services and employment, in addition to parity. That is an area where we need to do a lot of work.

The European Parliament has consistently called for the full adoption of the UNCPRD, as it has for conventions on many issues, including women's rights and the areas of disability and migrant rights. However, member states - I keep saying this but it is not to pass the buck - consistently state this is an issue of subsidiarity and the member state will decide. The Council is slow to grant these particular concessions to move all these areas to where there is uniformity throughout the European Union.