Disability Act - Critics have been proved all too right

Just one day into the life of the Disability Act 2005 demonstrates that the clamour of protest and criticism it attracted as a bill was justified.

Despite numerous demands from informed disability support groups and experts that the bill be completely overhauled, if not rejected, the Government went stubbornly ahead and enacted it into law.

It emerged yesterday, on its first day, that the new act allows government departments and public bodies up to 10 years to improve disabled access to their buildings.

The Government has afforded itself the luxury of a decade in which to provide essential access for people with disabilities to buildings which affect everybody’s normal contact with bureaucracy.

It is a disgraceful example to set for the private sector, and confirms the worst fears of those concerned about services for people with disabilities, that the act would ill-serve them.

Months before it was enacted, the bill was aptly described by the Irish Human Rights Commission as a “missed opportunity” to provide legislation which would meet the basic rights of disabled people.

In a written observation to Justice Minister Michael McDowell, it pointed out that there was no provision to provide basic standards of services for people with disabilities, contrary to international human rights law.

The bill was considered to be fundamentally flawed, not just once, but twice.

In 2001, a bill purporting to provide adequate services and funding for the disabled drew down on the Government so much contumely from outraged groups that it was withdrawn.

It subsequently materialised as the Disability Bill 2004 and again presented as the Government’s panacea for the disabled but, predictably, was equally criticised by concerned groups.

The Justice Minister established the Disability Legislation Consultation Group, representing people with disabilities, their families and other interested parties.

If the Government was sincere in looking after the interests of those whom the proposed legislation was to serve, it had, in this very representative group, a wealth of experience and expertise from which to draw.

Instead, it chose to largely ignore recommendations in a document the group produced, and proved that it was merely going through motions.

The Government adamantly refused to establish services for people with disabilities on a rights basis, which could be enforced by the courts.

A National Disability Authority has been established to monitor and report on the compliance with the provisions of the act, and despite the good intentions of its members, it is hardly comparable to having those rights reinforced by a court of law.