OPH X ENIL Urgent action against the EU care strategy
In September 2022, the European Commission published the European Care Strategy, including recommendations on long-term care and early childhood education. The Recommendation on Early Childhood Education clearly calls on EU Member States to include children with disabilities in mainstream services and to improve accessibility. We welcome these statements.
On the other hand, the recommendation on long-term care addresses disability from the perspective of the medical model of disability. Residential services are considered an option to care for people with disabilities. The only acceptable solutions to support persons with disabilities are personal assistance and home care services that place maximum control in the hands of the disabled person. The only actors who can now change these recommendations are national governments.
It is within the framework of this European strategy that ENIL and the DPO (previously OPH) wrote to Geneviève Darrieussecq in September 2022, to outline proposed amendments.