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Article 21 - Freedom of expression and opinion, and access to information
Background Documents | Article 21 Background
Seventh Session | Fifth Session | Fourth Session | Third Session
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Seventh Session
Governments
Non-governmental organizations
International Disability Caucus
Comments, proposals and amendments submitted electronically
Governments
CHINA
Amendment to Article 21: Freedom of expression and opinion, and access to information
States Parties shall take all appropriate measures to ensure that persons with disabilities can exercise their right to freedom of expression and opinion, including the freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas on an equal basis with others and through sign languages, subtitling, writing and Braille, and augmentative alternative communication and all other accessible means, modes and formats of communication of their choice (or: to use “through all ways and means of communication” to replace the language starting with “sign language” until “formats of communication”), including by:
(a) Providing information intended for the general public to persons with disabilities in accessible formats and technologies appropriate to different kinds of disabilities in a timely possible manner and without additional cost;
(b) Accepting and facilitating the use of sign languages, writing and Braille, and augmentative alternative communication and all other accessible means, modes and formats of communication of their choice by persons with disabilities in official interactions;
(c) Urging private entities that provide services to the general public, including through the Internet, to provide information and services in accessible and usable formats for persons with disabilities;
(d) Urging the mass media, including providers of information through the Internet, to make their services accessible to persons with disabilities;
(e) [[Developing] [Recognizing] [P and promoting] a the use of national sign language.]
EUROPEAN UNION
Article 21
States Parties shall take all appropriate measures to ensure that persons with disabilities can exercise their right to freedom of expression and opinion, including the freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas on an equal basis with others and through sign languages, and Braille, and augmentative alternative communication and all other accessible means, modes and formats of communication of their choice, including by:
EU Proposal (chapeau): delete “of their choice”.
(a) providing information intended for the general public in a timely manner and without additional cost to persons with disabilities in accessible formats and technologies appropriate to different kinds of disabilities;
(b) accepting and facilitating the use of sign languages, and Braille, and augmentative alternative communication and all other accessible means, modes and formats of communication of their choice by persons with disabilities in official interactions;
(c) urging private entities that provide services to the general public including through the internet to provide information and services in accessible and usable formats for persons with disabilities;
(d) urging the mass media, including providers of information through the Internet, to make their services accessible to persons with disabilities;
EU Proposal (d): Replace “urging” with “encouraging”.
(e) [[developing] [recognizing] [promoting] a national sign language.]
EU Proposal (e): Accept “recognizing” and replace “a national” with “the use of”. Sub-paragraph (e) would therefore read: “recognizing the use of sign language”.
Intervention on Article 21
20.1.2006 (Morning)
We support the text of the Chair on Article 20. Initially we had one suggestion regarding the substitution of the words ‘liberty of movement’ by ‘personal mobility’. Since some other delegations have made this suggestion we would like to state our support. Listening to this debate about whether we should have three articles, Article 9, Article 18 and Article 20, these should be retained as such. The focus of Article 20 is on the mobility of the individual and Article 9 relates to the enabling environment in which he moves. For e.g. a wheelchair provided in accordance with Article 20 ensures personal mobility but whether a building has a ramp on which he can move is dealt with in Article 9. There are some areas of overlap i.e. 2(b) of Article 9 and ‘b’ of Article 20. These could be looked into at the drafting stage. In Article 18 the focus is on international mobility. Therefore the three articles focus on different aspects and should remain separate.
Article 21
States Parties shall take all appropriate measures to ensure that persons with disabilities can exercise their right to freedom of expression and opinion, including the freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas on an equal basis with others and through sign languages, and Braille, and augmentative and alternative communication and all other forms of communication in accessible means, modes and formats of communication of their choice, including by:
(a) providing information intended for the general public in a timely manner and without additional cost to persons with disabilities in accessible formats and technologies appropriate to different kinds of disabilities;
(b) accepting and facilitating the use of sign languages, and Braille, and augmentative alternative communication and all other accessible means, modes and formats of communication of their choice by persons with disabilities in official interactions;
(c) requiring urging private entities that provide services to the general public including through the internet to provide information and services in accessible and usable formats for persons with disabilities;
(d) Requiring the mass media to take into account, in the provision of their services, all aspects of accessibility to persons with disabilities.
(d) Urging the mass media, including providers of information through the Internet, to make their services accessible to persons with disabilities.
(e) developing recognizing and promoting a national sign specific languages for persons with disabilities, including sign languages and deaf culture.
Article 21
States Parties shall take all appropriate measures to ensure that persons with disabilities can exercise their right to freedom of expression and opinion, including the freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas on an equal basis with others and through sign languages, and Braille, and augmentative alternative communication and all other accessible means, modes and formats of communication of their choice, including by:
(a) Providing information intended for the general public to persons with disabilities in accessible formats and technologies appropriate to different kinds of disabilities in a timely manner and without additional cost;
(b) Accepting and facilitating the use of sign languages, and Braille, and augmentative alternative communication and all other accessible means, modes and formats of communication of their choice by persons with disabilities in official interactions;
(c) Urging private entities that provide services to the general public, including through the Internet, to provide information and services in accessible and usable formats for persons with disabilities;
(d) Urging the mass media, including providers of information through the Internet, to make their services accessible to persons with disabilities;
(d.bis) Providing access to education and training on the use of alternative communication to the families of the persons with disabilities and to the general public.
(e) [[Developing] [Recognizing] [Promoting] a national sign language.]
Proposals for Article 21
In light of the fact that “communication” is defined very broadly in Article 3, we do not necessarily consider that it needs to be expanded upon in this Article. Doing so could potentially render confusion. We thus would suggest the re-drafting as follows:
States Parties shall take all appropriate measures to ensure that persons with disabilities can exercise their right to freedom of expression and opinion, including the freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas on an equal basis with others and through accessible means, modes and formats of communication of their choice, including by:
(a) providing information intended for the general public in a timely manner and without additional cost to persons with disabilities in accessible formats and technologies appropriate to different kinds of disabilities;
(b) accepting and facilitating, in official interactions, the use by persons with disabilities of accessible means, modes and formats of communication of their choice;
(c) Urging private entities that provide services to the general public, including through the Internet, to provide information and services in accessible and usable formats for persons with disabilities;
(d) Urging the mass media, including providers of information through the Internet, to make their services accessible to persons with disabilities;
(e) Recognizing and promoting sign languages.
Non-governmental organizations
INTERNATIONAL DISABILITY CAUCUS
Article 21
FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION AND OPINION AND Replace ACCESS by RIGHT TO INFORMATION
States Parties shall take all appropriate (DELETE: appropriate, replace with EFFECTIVE) measures to ensure that persons with disabilities can exercise their right to freedom of expression and opinion, including the freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas on an equal basis with others and through sign languages, and Braille, and augmentative (ADD: “and”) alternative (ADD: “modes and means of”) communication and all other accessible means, modes and formats of communication (ADD: “including electronic communication”) of their choice, including by:
(a) providing information intended for the general public in a timely manner and without additional cost to persons with disabilities in accessible formats and technologies appropriate to different kinds of disabilities;
(c) (DELETE THE WHOLE PARAGRAPH: urging private entities that provide services to the general public including through the internet to provide information and services in accessible and usable formats for persons with disabilities;)
(JUSTIFICATION: this issue has been moved to article 9 Accessibility)
(DELETE THE WHOLE PARAGRAPH (d): urging the mass media, including providers of information through the Internet, to make their services accessible to persons with disabilities;)
(JUSTIFICATION: same as above)
(e) REPLACE “[[developing] [recognizing] [promoting] a national sign language.]” BY “recognising and promoting sign languages;”
(JUSTIFICATION: There are several countries with more than one sign language)
(NEW (f) “recognizing Braille as the official script for blind persons;”)
(JUSTIFICATION: This is to ensure that States recognize Braille as the script for blind people, and also to ensure that technology is not seen as an acceptable alternative solution which will exclude Braille as a script.)
(NEW (g) “ providing training in communication and languages skills to persons with disabilities and to interpreters, assistants and intermediaries such as spoken and signed languages and tactile communication interpreters, note takers, readers and augmentative and alternative communication assistants, to ensure that persons with disabilities can make use of their freedom of expression and opinion in their preferred language or modes and mean of communication”)
(NEW (h) “facilitating access by persons with disabilities to high-quality communication aids, devices, assistive technologies, interpreters and forms of live assistance, including by making them available at affordable cost",)
(JUSTIFICATION: Ensuring availability and access to communication aids, assistive technologies, interpreters and communication assistants is of paramount importance in enabling freedom of expression to persons with communication needs; just as access to mobility aids is vital in facilitating liberty of movement - and is indeed ensured in Article 20 on Personal Mobility.)
(NEW (i) “respecting the freedom of expression, opinion and belief of persons with disabilities, including about the experience of disability and the freedom to choose practices of support for well-being, based on personal opinions and beliefs and ensuring that no person with a disability is subject to coercion which would impair the freedom to have or adopt a belief of his or her choice.”)
Article 21
Revisions:
“legally recognizing national sign languages, supporting their development and dissemination, and guaranteeing that a system is set up whereby sign language interpreters are trained and freely available”.
Comments:
In general, we support the current formulation of the draft article. As for paragraph (a), we support “information intended for the general public” that is provided in the current draft.
Related Domestic Measures:
NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF COMMUNITY LEGAL CENTRES
Article 21
Freedom of expression and opinion, and access to information
The NACLC notes that not all States have a formally acknowledged national sign language, and accordingly Article 21(e) may not be achievable.
Recommendation 16
That Article 21(e) be amended to read ‘developing, recognising, promoting sign language. If a State Party identifies a national sign language then it is this language that should be the focus of their development, recognition and promotion of sign language’.
PEOPLE WITH DISABILITY AUSTRALIA
Intervention on Article 21
(Australian) National Association of Community Legal Centres
Mr Chairperson:
This intervention is made on behalf of People with Disability Australia and the Australian National Association of Community Legal Centres. Thank you for the opportunity to address the Ad Hoc Committee.
We speak on two specific topics.
First, we strongly recommend that paragraph 21(c) is strengthened by replacing the word “urging” at the beginning of the paragraph with the word “ensure” and by including a reference to “public” entities in addition to the reference to the private sector. This would make it clear that States have a concrete obligation to require both private and public entities to make information and services accessible to persons with disability. We also strongly recommend the addition of the words “in accordance with international standards for accessibility” at the end of the paragraph. This would make clear the threshold that is required to be met in making information and services accessible, and provide the basis for ongoing development of standards in this area.
Second, we encourage the Committee to recognise that Deaf communities across the world have their own strong linguistic and cultural identities. Sign languages are languages in their own right, with their own lexicon and grammar. These languages give the Deaf a distinct identity that binds them together as a community. It is therefore vital that State Parties have legislation in place that recognises the languages of the Deaf communities in their own countries and that information and services utilise these languages. We therefore strongly recommend to the Committee that clause 21(e) be retained. However, as it is Deaf communities who develop sign languages, rather than governments, we suggest this paragraph be reworded to: ‘recognising and promoting national sign languages”. In this respect, it is important to note that in some countries Deaf communities use more than one sign language, just as in some countries more than one spoken language is used.
Thank you for the opportunity to address the Ad Hoc Committee.
PWDA
Report on National Consultations
Article 21
Some participants indicated that advocacy is sometimes necessary for people with disability because the barriers to free expression and communication are social as well as technical. Advocacy should not be relegated to only those areas of the lives of people with disability where support for having their rights met is required. Participants indicated that advocacy is also important to assist people to communicate, particularly for people with cognitive disability.
In addition, participants indicated that paragraph (e) should read ‘recognising’ a national sign language. The importance here was the need to accept sign language as an official language of nations. The example of the New Zealand government legislating that county’s sign language as an official language was provided.
Some participants indicated that there was a need to ensure, not urge, private entities, including the mass media to provide services to the general public, including people with disability and recommendations have been made thus.
Blind Citizens Australia made the point that the article does not spell out clearly the formats required by people who are blind or vision impaired nor does it provide guidance to web accessibility by referencing the acknowledged benchmark for internet accessibility as formulated by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI). While, sometimes it is accepted that ‘alternate formats’ includes formats for people who are blind or vision impaired, it is important to ensure that all articles are inclusive and ensure accessible for all people. It was recognised, however, that while the WAI may be a current benchmark, it is important not to ‘time-lock’ the convention by stating current initiatives. Other participants indicated that it may be favourable to include reference to international standards on web accessibility and accessible programming.
The matter of the need to clearly state what types of alternate formats are included was also raised by participants who indicated that plain language formats must equally be available, especially for people with cognitive disability. Several amendments to the Chair’s Text have been made to include these recommendations.
Recommended text:
States Parties shall take all appropriate measures to ensure that persons with disabilities can exercise their right to freedom of expression and opinion, including the freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas on an equal basis with others and through sign languages, and Braille, and augmentative alternative communication and all other accessible means, modes and formats of communication of their choice, including by:
(a) providing information intended for the general public in a timely manner and without additional cost to persons with disabilities in accessible formats and technologies appropriate to different kinds of disabilities;
(b) accepting and facilitating the use of sign languages, and Braille, large print and audio, plain language and augmentative alternative communication and all other accessible means, modes and formats of communication of their choice and advocacy by persons with disabilities in official interactions;
(c) ensuring private entities that provide services to the general public including through the internet to provide information and services in accessible and usable formats for persons with disabilities through adhering to international standards on web accessibility and accessible programming such as the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI);
(d) ensuring the mass media, including providers of information through the Internet, to make their services accessible to persons with disabilities through adhering to international standards on web accessibility and accessible programming such as the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI);
(e) recognizing a national sign language.