New initiative to boost rights of the disabled

Date: 20/04/2000

By John Shelley

THE European Commission will unveil a raft of initiatives next week designed to ensure that the EU leads by example in the fight to combat discrimination against people with disabilities.

Social Affairs Commissioner Anna Diamantopoulou will argue that money from Union coffers should only be provided for transport and infrastructure projects if they comply with approved standards or recognised best practice in providing access for the disabled.

She will also suggest that the EU executive should use its market power to force the Belgian authorities to improve access in the Brussels buildings which the Commission rents from the city. In addition, she will stress that the Union executive must ensure it is implementing its own rules on employing, informing and providing access for the disabled in full.

Officials say the key aim of the paper to be presented to the full Commission next Wednesday (26 April) is to ensure better coordination of the institution's policies on the disabled, not least by improving communications between departments. "This is the first comprehensive attempt to tackle this issue across the Commission," said one.

She added that while different directorates-general were individually doing good work in this area, they needed to consult colleagues in other departments more to ensure that any measures being planned would achieve their goals. She cited the example of an initiative to enable wheelchair-users to buy bus tickets over the Internet, adding: "What use is this if the buses do not 'kneel down' so they can get onto them?"

Diamantopoulou will also call next week for 2003 to be designated as the European year of people with disabilities, to give added impetus to the drive to ensure that the considerable barriers they face are dismantled.

The European Commission is to unveil a raft of initiatives designed to ensure that the EU leads by example in the fight to combat discrimination against people with disabilities.