Australian appointment to UN on Rights of Persons with Disabilities
Professor Ron McCallum OA from Australia has been elected to the United Nations Committee for the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, at the first meeting of countries that have ratified the convention.
The Committee, comprising seven men and five women, of which nine are persons with disabilities, will be in charge of monitoring the implementation of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
“Professor McCallum will bring vital experience and knowledge to the Committee and provide Australia with the opportunity to be at the forefront of reforms to the rights of people with disabilities,” said Dr Helen Szoke, chief executive officer/chief conciliator, Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission.
“Professor McCallum has achieved so much, against incredible odds, and worked all his life to find balances between the rights of employers to operate their businesses and the rights and obligations of employees.”
Discrimination based on ‘disability/impairment’ accounts for most of the complaints investigated in 2007/08 by the Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission (22% of total complaints, slightly less than last year), with the workplace the most common setting for these complaints.
“The Commission believes that businesses and industry groups need help to deliver on equal opportunity for people with disabilities,” said Dr Szoke.
The Commission’s submission to the Equal Opportunity Act Review recommends the clarification of ‘reasonable adjustments’ that employers, landlords and service providers are expected to make to accommodate a person with a disability.
Professor McCallum has used his own situation as an example. If it was generally agreed to be an inherent requirement of a law professor that she or he be able to read legal materials, then, being totally blind, Professor McCallum cannot read legal materials. However, with the assistance of computer-based adaptive technology and synthetic speech he is able to read legal material that is either scanned or on the Internet.
It only costs a couple of thousand dollars for the installation of this equipment, and, in this case, his employer made a reasonable accommodation by installing the extra equipment and providing training.
“People need to realise that if they feel that they have experienced discrimination based on their disability, they can ask us for advice and stand a chance for positive outcome,” said Dr Szoke. “Employers and industry groups are encouraged to be proactive in seeking the Commission’s advice and training services aimed at delivering equal opportunity in the workplace.”
