We cannot achieve sustainable development by leaving young people out of conversations: UK National Statement at the UN Conference of States Parties to the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities
Statement by UK Minister for Equalities, Seema Malhotra, at the UN Conference of States Parties to the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities General Debate.
The UK is determined to boost opportunity and champion the rights of disabled people.
The government works closely with disabled people and their representative organisations, ensuring that their views and voices are at the heart of everything that we do.
For instance, we have recently engaged with disabled people through a public consultation and call for evidence for our Equality, Race and Disability Bill.
The Bill will make the right to equal pay effective for disabled people and ethnic minorities, and introduce mandatory disability and ethnicity pay gap reporting for large employers.
We have appointed Lead Ministers for Disability who champion the interests of disabled people and disability inclusion and accessibility across their government department.
The UK Government remains strongly committed to implementing the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
We have developed a new training to increase knowledge of the Convention across government. We also recently extended the Convention to the British Overseas Territory of Bermuda.
Globally, we are faced with the climate and nature crisis and a greater number of conflicts than at any time since 1945. Disabled people are disproportionately affected by these crises, so promoting disability inclusion internationally is more important than ever.
This year marks the UN’s 80th anniversary. It serves as a reminder that only by acting together can we address global challenges head-on and defend human rights for all.
That is why we must build on the momentum of the Global Disability Summit in April.
At the summit, the UK announced ambitious commitments to mainstream disability in our international work.
This included generating $60m of investment capital from the Private Sector and multilateral institutions through the Assistive Technology Growth Fund; integrating disability inclusion in our ‘Green Cities and Infrastructure Centre of Expertise’; and ensuring that all our international education programming is disability inclusive.
The UK has also announced its co-chairing of the Global Action on Disability network of governments, civil society, foundations and the private sector, through which we will bring partners together in support of our stronger national and international systems that deliver disability rights, leave no one behind and implement the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.