European Association of Service Providers for Persons with Disabilities: Another human rights scandal – time for the EU to act!
Once again we are witnessing unacceptable living conditions of persons with disabilities in Europe. A new scandal has been recently denounced by the media. On this occasion the alarm has occurred in a Greek center for disable children run by the Greek State. Reported by the BBC, the information describes the terrible living conditions in a center in Lechaina, a small town in the south of the Hellenic country.
This new case joins the endless list of institutions in Europe that continue to run without respecting the rights enshrined in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and the Convention on the Rights of the Child. The more than inadequate practices and the violations of Human Rights in the center of Lechaina were already denounced by the Greek Ombudsman three years ago in a report issued in March 2011. The report concludes that there is a “significant shortage of services provided to the residents resulting from the lack of staff as well as from the nature of the institution –lack of standards, deficient care, systemic neglect of residents and unfavorable working conditions -“. Since then, little or no progress has been made.
The European Association of Service Providers for Persons with Disabilities (EASPD) considers that this situation highlights yet again the importance of having sufficient and skilled professionals in the sector and the need to come up with a solution from the European level since such human rights scandals are arising again and again throughout many European Member States. It is clearly a European problem, the EU must thus act and help Member States do better in this area.
