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Brexit threat to disability rights

This news post is almost 7 years old
 

Scottish social security minister says disabled rights must be protected

The UK government’s pursuit of a “hard Brexit” would widen the inequality gap faced by disabled people, social security Minister Jeane Freeman has said.

Freeman raised her concerns on a visit to Strasbourg where she discussed Scotland’s approach to promoting the rights of disabled people with the Council of Europe and members of the European Parliament.

Brexit poses a significant threat to the rights that disabled people currently have under international conventions – rights Freeman said must be protected.

She said: “While the Scottish Government continues working hard to improve the lives of disabled people in Scotland, we know a hard Brexit puts jobs at risk and will create a further attack on their rights, eroding the protections and obligations we have come to expect.

"Through my dialogue with the Council of Europe and the European Parliament, I stressed what we are already doing to uphold these principles.

“The best way of protecting rights and jobs is to ensure all the governments of the UK are part of Brexit negotiations and that our place in the Single Market is maintained.

“The UK government’s on-going austerity agenda is already damaging the rights of those with disabilities – with a UN committee finding there had been “grave and systematic violations” of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

“That is why it is even more essential that this government does all it can to ensure we adhere the UN Convention, as well as continue to press the UK government to meet to its obligations and ensure that, through the Brexit negotiations, disability rights are explicitly safeguarded and not eroded.”

 

Comments

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Rose Burn
almost 7 years ago
I am sorry but how can Brexit affect disability rights? Those rights are surely bound up in Scottish and U.K. Legislation, not in any EU rules and regulations? Can anyone point to anything in detail? Otherwise this story sounds like a Minister trying to be rather ambiguous in what they say?
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Jack
almost 7 years ago
Lets be honest Rose the truth and Ms Freeman aren't exactly bosom buddies, an example of which is the nurse she and Joanna Cherry briefed against for having the audacity to question the First Minister. The claim she was married to a Conservative councillor was entirely made up in an attempt to undermine her point. This is another concern anyway, why on earth would who she chooses to have a relationship with be of any importance at all? Unless of course you're a member of a party who thinks it's acceptable to crush all dissenting voices.
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