Deinstitutionalisation of persons with disabilities
Recommendation 2227
(2022)
Author(s):
Parliamentary Assembly
Origin
Assembly
debate on 26 April 2022 (12th sitting) (see Doc. 15496, report of the Committee on Social Affairs, Health and
Sustainable Development, rapporteur: Ms Reina de Bruijn-Wezeman;
and Doc. 15509, opinion of the Committee on Equality and Non-Discrimination,
rapporteur: Ms Liliana Tanguy). Text
adopted by the Assembly on 26 April 2022 (12th sitting).
1. The Parliamentary Assembly refers
to its Resolution 2431
(2022) “Deinstitutionalisation of persons with disabilities”,
its Resolution 2291 (2019) and Recommendation 2158 (2019) “Ending
coercion in mental health: the need for a human rights-based approach”,
and its Recommendation
2091 (2016) “The case against a Council of Europe legal
instrument on involuntary measures in psychiatry”.
2. The Assembly reiterates the urgent need for the Council of
Europe, as the leading regional human rights organisation, to fully
integrate the paradigm shift initiated by the United Nations Convention
on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) into its work.
It thus recommends that the Committee of Ministers:
2.1 support member States in their
development, in co-operation with organisations of persons with disabilities,
of adequately funded, human rights-compliant strategies for deinstitutionalisation
with clear time frames and benchmarks with a view to a genuine transition
to independent living for persons with disabilities in accordance
with Article 19 of the CRPD;
2.2 prioritise support to member States to immediately start
transitioning to the abolition of coercive practices in mental health
settings, and to child-centred, human rights-compliant deinstitutionalisation
of children with disabilities;
2.3 in line with the unanimously adopted Recommendation 2158 (2019), refrain
from endorsing or adopting draft legal texts which would make successful
and meaningful deinstitutionalisation, as well as the abolition
of coercive practices in mental health settings more difficult,
and which go against the spirit and the letter of the CRPD – such
as the draft additional protocol to the Convention for the protection
of Human Rights and Dignity of the Human Being with regard to the
Application of Biology and Medicine: Convention on Human Rights
and Biomedicine (ETS No. 164, Oviedo Convention) concerning the protection
of human rights and dignity of persons with regard to involuntary
placement and involuntary treatment within mental healthcare services.
