JIU/REP/2018/6 ENHANCING ACCESSIBILITY FOR PERSONS WITH DISABILITIES TO CONFERENCES AND MEETINGS OF THE UNITED NATIONS SYSTEM Prepared by Gopinathan Achamkulangare Joint Inspection Unit Geneva 2018 United Nations JIU/REP/2018/6 Original: ENGLISH ENHANCING ACCESSIBILITY FOR PERSONS WITH DISABILITIES TO CONFERENCES AND MEETINGS OF THE UNITED NATIONS SYSTEM - Prepared by Gopinathan Achamkulangare Joint Inspection Unit United Nations, Geneva 2018 iii EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Enhancing accessibility for persons with disabilities to conferences and meetings of the United Nations system JIU/REP/2018/6 I. Background and context About 15 per cent of the world’s population is estimated to live with some form of disability.1 In almost all societies, persons with disabilities face more barriers than those without, with regard to participation in and access to deliberative processes, and are at greater risk of being left behind. The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, which currently guides the developmental activities of all United Nations system organizations, is aimed at addressing these inequities through the key pledge to “leave no one behind”. Indeed, the Sustainable Development Goals reference disability in seven targets across five goals, while another six goals have targets linked to disability-inclusive development. A perspective relating to the inclusion of persons with disabilities and their rights, as outlined in the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and particularly as relates to accessibility, must consequently be effectively incorporated into all facets of the work of the United Nations system organizations. Persons with disabilities should have a representative voice, chosen by persons with disabilities themselves, in every platform that has an impact on their interests, for they are best positioned to identify their own needs and the most suitable policies for meeting those needs. In the United Nations system, such deliberative platforms are the meetings and conferences convened. Organizations of persons with disabilities follow the tenet of “nothing about us without us”. Their active inclusion sends a clear message to decision-makers and society at large that they are rights holders capable of participating and engaging meaningfully at all levels of society, and that they can themselves be agents, not merely beneficiaries, of change. Making conferences and meetings fully accessible therefore becomes a critical indicator of the willingness of United Nations system organizations to truly “walk the talk” when it comes to non-discrimination and inclusion. The present review was included in the programme of work of the Joint Inspection Unit (JIU) for 2018, to assess the current status of accessibility for persons with disabilities to United Nations system conferences and meetings. The main findings and conclusions of the review and its 10 recommendations are outlined below. II. Mandates for addressing accessibility A mandate to enhance accessibility was first received with the adoption of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities in 2006, which has a dedicated section on accessibility (article 9). Article 9 has often been described as the “backbone” of the Convention. The Convention emphasizes the role of universal design to increase the accessibility of environments and enable full inclusion and participation in society, and it calls for the implementation of minimum standards and guidelines for the accessibility of facilities and services open or provided to the public. To monitor the implementation of the Convention, the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities was established, which has focused further attention on accessibility through the adoption of general comment No. 2 (2014) on accessibility. In that general 1 The World Health Organization and the World Bank, World Report on Disability, WHO/NMH/VIP/11.01. iv comment, the Committee sets out the legal context for accessibility, defines barriers to participation as a form of discrimination and underscores the role of international cooperation in promoting accessibility. Building on the Convention, the Human Rights Council has adopted multiple resolutions focused on three key aspects of accessibility, namely, adopting standards and guidelines, undertaking upgrades and providing services and devices, and enhancing institutional capacity. In terms of legislative mandates, the General Assembly has addressed accessibility through resolutions that cover the built environment, information and communications technology (ICT), services, transport, attitudes and sensitivity, universal design (“essential for some, useful for all”) and reasonable accommodation. Among the specialized agencies, only the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) has a specific mandate on accessibility from its legislative body. Given that most resolutions and decisions relating to disability are inspired by the Convention, in the present report, the Inspector calls for all organizations in the United Nations system to respect the spirit and letter of the Convention and voluntarily assume the obligations under article 9 on accessibility, including by incorporating its provisions into their policy on accessibility. III. Policies, guidelines, standards and benchmarks on accessibility A dedicated policy on accessibility should serve as the essential foundational document outlining the principles that should guide an organization’s work in that area. Only ITU and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) have a policy on accessibility; the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights has a policy on reasonable accommodation, and the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) has a disability policy targeted at its beneficiaries. Seven other organizations have policies on the employment of persons with disabilities that also include elements of accessibility. The review identifies good practice elements in the existing policies, which organizations can take into consideration when developing their own policies. The Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), ITU and the World Health Organization (WHO) have issued highly instructive guidance documents to make their conferences and meetings more accessible, while the International Labour Organization, the United Nations Development Group, the United Nations Development Programme, the United Nations Population Fund and UNRWA have issued guidance on the mainstreaming of the Convention and the disability inclusion agenda in programmatic work (see annex I). The findings of the review indicate that there are no international standards on accessibility that are accepted and used system-wide in the United Nations. Each organization simply attempts to conform to the accessibility standards outlined in the building codes and disability acts of the host country. The exception to this is UNICEF, which has established three levels of accessibility applicable to all its offices globally. This constitutes a best practice that should be reviewed and replicated by all organizations, adapting it to their own context. Annex II to the present document lists documentation, including international standards, guidelines, recommendations and one technical paper, addressing the built environment and ICT for organizations to consider when developing aspirational benchmarks on accessibility. By utilizing good practice elements from the above-mentioned documentation, organizations can and should develop a comprehensive policy and guidelines on the accessibility of conferences and meetings (recommendation 1). Policy development should involve all relevant internal offices and include persons with disabilities. Once established, v the minimum criteria can serve as a baseline to develop aspirational standards for system- wide accessibility. IV. Accessible facilities and services at headquarters, field and off-site locations and user satisfaction To determine the existence of accessible facilities and services for conferences and meetings, the JIU questionnaire contained a checklist whereby organizations were requested to indicate whether they provided a given facility, service or tool. Sixteen organizations provided responses to the checklist (see annex III) in relation to facilities and services in their headquarters location only. Overall, the responses indicate that the vast majority of the organizations are not providing many of the essential ICT and other services that would make meetings and conferences more accessible for persons with disabilities. With regard to field office accessibility, all organizations noted that they lagged considerably behind their headquarters counterparts due to factors that included: restrictions on physical modifications to rented or heritage status premises; resource limitations; remote locations; and short-term leases. Most organizations acknowledged that, for meetings held at off-site locations, they did not adequately monitor accessibility provisions, nor did they set minimum accessibility requirements beyond asking for compliance with local accessibility regulations. As a recommended best practice, ITU includes provisions in host country agreements for the host to ensure accessible facilities within the conference premises (recommendation 2). To ascertain the views of persons with disabilities, interviews were conducted with organizations of persons with disabilities and with United Nations system staff and