Edf answers to List of Issues on the eu report

Article 20, Personal mobility (Question 24, List of Issues).

Please indicate what concrete initiatives the European Union is taking to secure spontaneous and independent travel for persons with disabilities, as well as assistance and accompanying persons free of charge at local, regional, national and international level?

Persons with disabilities can make use of EU legislation on the liability of carriers of the different transport modes in cases of loss and/or damage of mobility equipment. However, with air travel the liability is limited by the Montreal Convention to approximately €1,220 (€1,000 Special Drawing Rights) no matter how high the value of the mobility equipment is and the nature of the damage⁸⁴. This limit does not apply in rail and road travel, which is a good example and this should be extended to air travel.

The EU reply to the List of Issues lacks information on the inaccessibility of transport which prevents independent access and spontaneous travel. Inaccessible bus terminals, for example, are an obstacle for persons with disabilities to receive assistance according to Regulation 181/2011 on the rights of bus and coach passengers. The Regulation obliges Member States to notify the Commission of a list of accessible bus terminals. Some Member States do not mention any accessible bus terminal (e.g. Austria, Italy, or Poland)⁸⁵. In contrast, some Member States list bus stations as ‘accessible’ where this is unlikely to be the case in practice.

Equal access to any mode of transport cannot be guaranteed unless personal assistants are covered at no additional cost when travelling. This issue is not addressed in EU legislation yet and the EU fails to address this aspect in its reply to the List of Issues.

For information on passengers’ rights legislation, please see our answer under question 25.

17. Article 20, Personal mobility (Question 25, List of Issues).

Please explain how the European Union is systematically monitoring and following up on the implementation of all directives and regulations on air , rail, bus and coach passengers, and sea and inland waterways by Member States and operators?

The Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union gives the EU the mandate to develop a common transport policy⁸⁶. Passengers’ rights also fall under this competence. All EU Member States set up National Enforcement Bodies (NEBs) to handle complaints and implement the passengers’ rights legislation.

There are two main problems with the enforcement and implementation of EU passengers’ rights at national level.

First, there is a lack of information about the existence and the role of the NEBs amongst passengers. The complaints procedures are in some cases not accessible for persons with disabilities (e.g. complaint forms are not standardised or are available only in inaccessible formats⁸⁷). This amounts to underreporting. A consultation with local, regional and national DPOs by the European Commission could provide more realistic numbers.

Second, the mandates of the NEBs vary a lot across Europe⁸⁸. Some have stronger competences (e.g. to issue a binding opinion that can be used in court), others only have observatory powers. In the latter, passengers with disabilities are forced to seek redress in court. This is costly, time-consuming and stressful.

Stricter enforcement of passengers’ rights legislation, better implementation and quality control of the assistance offered at airports and stations are needed. The NEBs should be a single contact point to get accessible information about passengers’ rights as well as to lodge a complaint directly in an accessible way. NEBs should raise awareness about this possibility for passengers and it should be verified whether transport undertakings treat complaints with sufficient importance.

Infringement procedures by the Commission are a useful tool for monitoring the implementation of accessibility requirements in EU legislation. We welcome, for example, the work done by the Commission in the case of Regulation 181/2011 on bus and coach passengers’ rights⁸⁹. This tool could be used more to remedy problems with implementation and it could be complemented with a separate mechanism for individual complaints.

The right to access and to transportation under passengers’ rights legislation is also often overridden by ‘safety rules’. We can prove that in many cases boarding of passengers with disabilities is denied (see for example case study no. 4 of the Annex to the 2014 EDF position paper on passengers’ rights)⁹⁰.

The European Health Insurance Card⁹¹ (EHIC), as mentioned in the EU reply, is a general card for all European citizens. It does not guarantee free movement for persons with disabilities when travelling to another Member State or the accessibility of and non-discriminatory treatment by the public health care providers in the Member States.

For more information on the accessibility of health care providers in the EU, please see IF submission.

18. Article 24, education (Questions 27 and 28, List of Issues).

Please indicate what concrete initiatives the European Union has taken to ensure that the funding instruments and the actions of Member states towards fulfilment of the education targets within the Europe 2020 Strategy promote inclusive quality education. In what way are representative organisations of persons with disabilities involved in the monitoring at EU and Member State level?

Please clarify whether there are disability specific indicators in the Europe 2020 strategy when pursuing the target on education.

The EU has a supporting competence in the field of education. The EU can play a key role in promoting inclusive education and access to education for all learners with disabilities, at all levels of the educational system⁹². It can do so by using European funding to support the development of educational services, to promote accessibility, to exchange programmes and to adopt non-discrimination legislation in education.

The EU is pursuing the objective of reducing school drop-outs and to increase access to tertiary education⁹³. An indicator on access to education for persons with disabilities should be included in the EU economic strategy to develop specific measures to address the gap between students with and without disabilities, and to develop adequate responses to eliminate barriers. The EU should carry out a mapping of the implementation of inclusive education policies across the EU.

The EU student exchanges programmes, such as Erasmus+ have improved in recent years by including financial support for students with disabilities. In practice, many barriers to accessing national education systems remain. The EU should evaluate access to inclusive education, including access to European exchange programmes by persons with disabilities. Barriers and good practices should be identified in close cooperation with Member States, students’ organisations and organisations of persons with disabilities. The European Commission should fund research on accessible pedagogical material, the use of ICT in the classroom and reasonable accommodation in education, paying special attention to children in need of high-level support.

Data on inclusive education are not comparable across EU countries. A European data collection strategy is needed, focusing on the implementation of Article 24 CRPD. This strategy should aim to investigate precisely what key information and data may be required, examining whether such data exist and clarifying what work is required to gather the data that may additionally be needed⁹⁴.

The European Commission should evaluate and report on the use of the ESI and other funding instruments in promoting inclusive education for pupils with disabilities⁹⁵.

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