 Good evening everyone. I'd like to say a very special welcome to you this evening joining us for mini law school on Disability human rights and the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. I'd like to extend a very special welcome to Minister Leonard Pereira for joining us this evening and Of course, you are included in our special guest list My name is Andy Vine. I am the manager for race relations equity and inclusion at the Nova Scotia Human Rights Commission We hope to have a really interesting evening tonight and without any further ado from myself I'm going to call on David Shannon my and our Director and Chief Executive Officer of the Nova Scotia Human Rights Commission. Welcome David Thank you Anne and I think it's a wonderful to be able to be here With with everyone and I'll be very brief as some of you may know Dean Brooks Unfortunately can't be here today. So I get to speak on my own behalf and And on behalf of Dean Brooks I can say as the director of the Nova Scotia Human Rights Commission What how very thrilled all of us are to see everyone here also to partner with with Dalhousie Schulich School of Law and the work with With all of the community partners to be able to be here tonight To see the wonderful turnout this evening tells me a great deal about interest in the convention of the rights of people with Disabilities also at large the interest in human rights in Nova Scotia and Halifax and the and the role that the CRPD can play in galvanizing that interest in human rights and looking toward creating a framework for greater inclusion for people with disabilities Makes me very happy to be here because I am a a Dalhaw alumnus and I think with the that was some time ago that I came to Dalhousie and I think of them being able to include me as As a student in the law school at a time when People with disabilities were barred barred from law schools right across North America Barred for practical reasons because there was no physical access barred for some of the invisible reasons related to To accommodation barred for a host of reasons that meant that people with disabilities could not aspire in their academic aspirations could not aspire in their employment or their life aspirations For me Dalhousie law school created that framework and I think the CRPD in the discussions we will hear today Creates a framework for what is now One billion people in the world with disabilities the World Health Organization Estimates there is now a billion people with disabilities globally Well, the CRPD is not going to be the immediate panacea It's going to create the framework though so that those persons can have families Go to school Live the kind of fulfilling life that Dalhousie law school was the model for me and has been the model for other people with disabilities and I think it's very Important and very inspiring to know that here here we Start the discussion on the CRPD Secondly It's a momentous here and this is a momentous here last year was supposed to be as you will hear Because last year the federal government was supposed to submit its report on the CRPD to the experts committee under the CRPD well The federal government never did that in 2012 and here we are into March of 2013 and they still haven't done it So I'm still staying optimistic that this will be a momentous here that the report will be written However, it will also be very important for all of us as NGOs academics and others across Nova Scotia, Canada to write a shadow report in other words We should respond to the federal government and if we're going to succeed at that The we're going to need Community engagement this starts tonight starts the process of that community engagement So we can get the necessary input and we can respond to the federal government's report when it comes so tonight we look forward to the discourse beginning the disc being the level of discourse continuing to heighten and develop around the CRPD and and many many And ultimately what we're really here for and that is a continued continued Greater and fuller inclusion for people with disabilities around the globe and in particular to address the address the particular the the necessary plan of For Nova Scotia, but thanks. I'll hand it over to our fine speakers tonight Thank you very much David, I just want to quickly introduce Tammy and Shane who are interpreters for this evening Tonight we have a group of distinguished speakers and experts in the field of disability and human rights and They will be presenting to us. I will be keeping very strict time and We've chatted about that. So if you see me, you know to word So tonight we would invite Steve Estay to come and address us firstly Steve is the chair of the International Committee the council of Canadians with disabilities, so Steve would like to invite you to Where are you going to be with your side? Good evening, it's great to see such a big crowd of people here tonight I'm excited to be here and to share with you for a few minutes a little bit of the background I think that some of the other speakers are going to talk about the substance of the convention This evening I wanted to take a few minutes and give you a bit of a history behind it It's I just didn't appear one day at the UN Somebody with a document that says here's a convention about the rights of people with disabilities It took us a long time to get to that. I want to talk for a few minutes about that Maybe set a little bit of a stage Really, there are two streams of events that took place at the UN Over the course of the from the founding of the UN up until the convention came into force that kind of Converged in the convention. I want to talk a little bit about those first very quickly talk about International human rights and the development of international human rights law Because as you know the UN was founded after the Second World War Countries came together and talked about the atrocities of the war and said we don't want to go through these kinds of things again We want to find a way to work together in peaceful coexistence and protect the rights of people around the world so one of the first things that they did in 1948 was they Agreed upon a document called the Universal Declaration of Human Rights That's a kind of foundational document of the UN and it sets out The basic human rights that all people have Talks about the right to assembly the right to elections the right to not be locked up The right to worship your god of your choice all of those basic human rights that we all know and understand so that document came about in 1948 and after that nations of the world talked about Kind of refining their understanding around what these rights look like and there was a process to develop two things called Covenants first with a covenant on civil and political rights and the second of the Covenant on Economic social and cultural rights if you're simply put those things Are the whole substance of the Universal Declaration do you think about the Covenant on economic social and cultural rights? I always think of it as a document that talks about the things that government should do They should provide you with an education. They should provide you with access to health care those kinds of things Whereas the other thing the Covenant on civil and political rights is more the kinds of things Maybe the government shouldn't do they ought not to lock you up and throw away the key They ought not to prevent you from moving across borders as you see fit Those kinds of things you have that kind of background Then both three documents together are called the International Bill of Rights International Bill of Human Rights From that the UN system began to look and elaborate more in detail about specific kinds of populations and through the 1970s and 80s they looked at the idea that there are certain groups in society that have perhaps challenges in realizing these civil rights and the elaborated conventions on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women and convention on the rights of the child and Convention on and I've written this one down Convention on the elimination of discrimination of all forms of racial Discrimination, so you've got these kind of thematic conventions that evolved after the Bill of Rights conventions So you have that kind of human rights background or framework if you will I want to just set that aside for a minute How am I doing for time? I better be fast five. Okay. All right. I'm afraid of Ann. That's why I'm checking all the time Against this background of International human rights framework you have at the same time a process of the UN of an evolving understanding around disability But that happens in the kind of think of it as disability policy and programming in the UN system You see that stuff starting off in the early 1970s So sometime after the human rights discussions there were begin to be discussions about disability in the UN system And it's 1970s it was very very preliminary some discussions about Some provisions of rights for people with intellectual disabilities and so on They began to get on the radar screen in the mid 70s They decided that they would set up a thing called the international year for people with disabilities and that was in 1981 so the UN set up this year and They said to countries around the world you can celebrate people with disabilities in whatever way you wish We want to hear about that and exchange information about it and so on so 81 happened and Had some small celebrations There wasn't really a lot of energy around it But it did happen and the important thing about it is that it kicked off a Process because when the UN bureaucrats got together to think about this They said hey that year was a great thing So what are we gonna do well if a year was a good thing why not have a decade? So we'll have a decade of people with disabilities and that's what they did they declared from 1982 to 1992 the UN decade of people with disabilities and Some of you like me are old enough to remember that and I lived through that UN decade and and the interesting thing about it the important thing about it is that With these decades come various milestones and benchmarks the mid decade in 1987 there was a mid decade conference that was held in Italy and at that mid decade conference people with disabilities gathered to Talk about the progress of the decade and so on but all that happened against the background we were talking about the the development of these thematic trees the convention on the rights of the child and things like that that was happening at the same time so Disabled people said in 1987. Hey, maybe we need to have a Convention on the rights of people with disabilities. So the first culprit this was in 1987 It didn't go anywhere, but at the end of the decade they called for it again in 1992 they called for a convention again didn't happen in 1992 either But what did happen is the government of Sweden felt badly because it didn't go forward They said we need to do something about this So they set up a process to develop thing called the standard rules for the equalization of opportunities for people with disabilities poof a long title but those standard rules in 1982 we're 1992 came forward and they kicked off a process that got people talking more in the UN system about this and 1998 the can the committee of economic social and cultural rights adopted a General comment that talked about the human rights of people with disabilities and this is very important Pivotal moment because it's the first time in the UN system that they equated People with disabilities and human rights in an official document. So it's 1998 that you see the launch of a Process that leads us to the convention on the rights of people with disabilities very quickly in the 30 seconds And I have left say from that 1998 Document we have a process the High Commissioner for Human Rights sets up a process of study Then two academics surveyed countries in the world to talk about Situation people with disabilities and human rights that study called for a convention on the rights of people with disabilities And it was from that study that the government of Mexico introduced a resolution in the UN General Assembly in December of 2001 to initiate the process of the ad hoc committee, which gets us to where we are today And I think that is probably over time. Thank you for your indulgence madam chair That's a quick background to the CRPD. Thanks very much Okay, I can't show my favoritism anymore Okay, our next speaker is oh, thank you very much Steve for that very energizing presentation. It was Very passionately presented Our next speaker this evening is no stranger to us professor Archie Kaiser Here at the Schulitz School of Law professor Kaiser. Would you come to the podium, please? Shouldn't clap before I speak Get my notes So Well, thank you to all of you for attending this evening I recognize that I'm making two of the organizers nervous And I frankly delight a bit in that It's because they think the combination of a law professor a 27-page international human rights treaty and 44 PowerPoint slides may not fit in with 10 minutes My slides ready to go. I'm ready to go Oh Well, you know, I'm sort of technologically challenge. So this isn't counting in my time go ahead Well, let me see that one that looks like mine There we go now I'm officially starting so Let's get to the heart of it That was the outline. I Want to talk about why this is Significant it's the first 21st century human rights Treaty from the United Nations and as I've noted here There was no prior treaty that specifically dealt with the rights of persons with disabilities It was rapidly negotiated with a high level of participation by persons with disabilities And it was greeted with and remains a Document that has created unprecedented enthusiasm Steve mentions It has been seen as finally empowering the world's largest minority and now we have a hundred and fifty-five Signatories and a hundred and twenty-nine ratifications to the treaty itself Canada ratified it in 2010 Why is it significant? It reflects a new world consensus on the nature of disability and I can't emphasize how significant that is The CRPD imposes a wide range of obligations on the state's parties to ensure that all of the rights enshrined in the CRPD are Actually implemented it requires ongoing vigilance by state parties to ensure that it's implemented and monitored And it requires the participation of persons with disabilities So it's significant as well because it links protections of individual rights With broader entitlements to positive rights such as the right to live in the community the right to health the right to work The right to an adequate standard of living the right to participate in political public and cultural life The government of Canada has said and this is crucially important for our country that this treaty and Canada's ratification of it embodies a shift away from a charity and medical model approach towards a human dignity approach to disability and The United Nations itself says that this marks a paradigm shift in attitudes and approaches to persons with disabilities They're no longer to be seen as objects of charity medical treatment and social protection But rather as subjects who have rights who are capable of claiming those rights and making decisions for their own lives It gives universal recognition to the dignity of persons with disabilities So In the slides which are also going to be available on the website I'm told so that you can have them I go through the differences between you know The perspective of the disability model or social model and the medical model, but crucially here We see that in this graph That from the medical models perspective the focus is on the impairment and the individual But from the social model perspective the disability model the focus is on the social context and the environment so Then the question becomes not how can we cure you as an individual? How can we fix you the question is more because disability is constructed by society the question is as at the bottom there How do we prevent and alleviate social discrimination? How do we resist the domination of persons with disabilities while moving society towards understanding disability in a progressive manner? So it has transformative potential you know this convention because of its widespread acceptance in the world community and because of the model that it imposes on all of us The medical model still has a place You know But it fits in as part of the broader kinds of rights that people have the rights of persons with disabilities to the maximum level Of health not you know the medical model being imposed upon people So what is disability you may well ask under this? Convention and this is a critical understanding that we all have to achieve here Disability under the convention is not defined precisely But there are several articles which give us an indication of what the world community now thinks about disability and Basically here what we see is that the question is you know when persons have impairments What are the? Attitudinal and environmental barriers that hinder their full and effective participation in society on an equal basis with others So that the concern is the removal of barriers as article 1 says Sorry the preamble says persons with disabilities continue to face barriers in their participation as equal members of society So you know the convention itself is a complex instrument You know article 3 has several general principles, you know, which are often thought of as the moral compass of the convention respect for dignity non-discrimination and full and effective participation among other values the Value of participation in inclusion is one that permeates this treaty and we're talking about Conclusion is our inclusion in terms of it being a general principle a general obligation and a right in many different respects There are other general principles that we have to think about as well the principle of non-discrimination of course And the issue surrounding accessibility accessibility very broadly conceived It's a general principle. It's a standalone article and access here means access to justice access to living independently and being included in the community Access to information and communication services education health and an adequate standard of living among other things Canada has like other states parties assumed many obligations to ensure that the Promotion of the full realization of the rights of persons with disabilities will be achieved So Canada has an affirmative obligation as other nations do to adopt appropriate legislation To modify or abolish existing laws that impose discrimination upon persons with disabilities And to take into account, you know, the the needs of persons with disabilities in all lawmaking You can see here that the convention structure is complicated I don't have time to go over it. Those are the basic articles that goes on, you know For two whole pages just the structure of it I'm going to move on to look at some of the rights in the convention And they certainly include some of the ones that you would expect equality before the law right to life liberty and security of the person freedom from torture exploitation respect of physical and mental integrity and some of these will be developed by the people who follow me There are individual rights and this is just a sample individual rights Which are interconnected some protect people in extreme or abusive situations Others are ones which provide continuous protection in what might be called normal conditions You know where we're not dealing with the extremes of humanity There are also positive collective or societal rights, and I've mentioned them in part But you know they include these many rights that are intended ultimately to foster inclusion in society If all of you were lawyers, and I had much more time I'd explain, you know the basic answer to this question Is it law and I guess the basic answer that I would give is it's a form of law It's meant to influence law in our country Although it's precise legal effects, you know, we'll have to see them evolve I'd talk about, you know, how Canada receives treaties whether Canada is transformationist or adoptionist But basically whether or not it's an implemented or unimplemented treaty which are interesting legal questions I'm going through this rather too quickly, but the major point is That the convention is going to influence the interpretation of the law and also our charter of rights and freedoms That they have to be infused with the values of the convention on the rights of persons with disabilities Because it becomes part of our law in that indirect sense at the very least I've got three minutes. I've got one minute There is a very important debate that I wish I could explore with you about whether for example The convention prohibits involuntary hospitalization and treatment I'd like to talk about that specifically because you know that becomes one of the areas which is most contentious You know under the treaty But let us just say that there are arguments that would suggest that it does prohibit involuntary Hospitalization and treatment at the very least It imposes the values of a restraint and last resort if nothing else There is a duty to scrutinize all legislation with the spirit of the convention in mind Both because Canada has assumed this obligation under the treaty and because Canada can't have entered the treaty in bad faith You know that the Vienna Convention and the treaty itself says you can't have reservations or declarations which are inconsistent with the treaty So Canada has made a declaration in reservation. No doubt professor Wildman will talk about that in part But I don't think it goes so far as some people suggest to undermine the treaty. It can't be read that way The treaty must be implemented. There must be accountability Basically the the treaty itself has I believe you know changed the world for people with disabilities the The treaty is meant to ensure that all of us look at people with disabilities in a different way It ensures that the disability model will have pervasive transformative effects If the CRPD becomes a baseline for assessing current and future legislation The CRPD will influence the content of individual rights and broader economic social and cultural rights and Canada will be accountable for its action or its inaction with respect to this treaty There are high expectations across the world for states parties to conform with the treaty and I think that they are especially important in Canada because we are a rich nation and Because we're a nation that has said that it has a commitment to the implementation of human rights So, you know the the eyes of the world ought to be on Canada as the first report is released and I think they may well find us wanting in many respects Next you're going to hear from speakers who will zero in on some of the special problems in this that are associated with implementing the Convention on the rights of persons with disabilities Thank you Thank you very much professor Kaiser for a very informative presentation One thing I'd like to quickly mention that, you know Nova Scotia has got a stake very much in the in the CRPD because Steve Estay and Dulcy McCollum Been parties to to support him and to getting this convention going they have been on the committee is the UN Committee for that So it's it's important that we take note I'd like to introduce to you at this time Hopefully I pronounce her name properly and Christine or grant her top. Yes wonderful Christine is principal researcher for mental health and human rights Evaluation project and she's with the Mental Health Commission of Canada. Welcome to the podium Christine Good evening. It's an honor to be here this evening and among such inspiring people and It's a wonderful opportunity to share some of the research that we did And it's also very timely that we're having this discussion because I don't know how many of you know or familiar with the Report that just came out from the United Nations special rubber tour on torture Which focuses on abuses in health care settings and he states Severe abuses such as neglect mental and physical abuse and sexual violence continue to be committed against people with psychosocial disabilities and people with intellectual disabilities in health care settings and picking up on what Archie said in terms of the key one of the key controversies of the CRPD There he says there can be no therapeutic Justification for the use of solitary confinement and prolonged restraint of persons with disabilities and psychiatric institutions both prolonged Seclusion and restraint may constitute torture and ill treatment. So That was just a very timely statement that came out today and what I'm going to be talking about this evening is Some research that was done and it was in Supported by the Mental Health Commission of Canada. I'm not an employee of Mental Health Commission of Canada but I was the principal researcher on this project and This project came about As a result of the work that Archie Kaiser did along with Cindy player from the equity and human rights office at The University of Victoria in British Columbia And they were the architects of this this research project and they advocated strongly that research be conducted to evaluate mental health legislation policies and standards with the human rights lens so Myself and my peers at the Public Interest Law Center and Canadian Mental Health Association in the Winnipeg office beginning in April 2009 Until November 2010 we conducted research that formed the basis of developing an instrument to evaluate legislation policies and standards Against key rights and principles that are contained in the Convention on the Rights for Persons with disabilities So before I say much more I want to point out that my slides Largely consist of images and these images were taken by people with lived experience by people experiencing mental illness and These images represent for them some of their experiences when it comes to the realization of human rights for themselves and So this first slide is really showing pictures about barricades and yellow tape and just sort of symbolizing some of The difficulties they experience or have experienced in having their own human rights Realized and you'll recognize the one on the far left is actually the McDonald bridge here in Halifax so When we speak of our main purpose in this project one of our first tasks was to learn how human rights were defined or Experienced according to individuals living with mental illness. This was in many ways In the mental health sector We weren't hearing that often in this country. Anyway, those concepts being brought together So we needed to learn from people with lived experience what that meant And so with the experiences of individuals with mental illness that was our guide That was our focus and so and that fed into our main Purpose which was to evaluate existing legislation Here in the provinces and the policies and the standards or the the framework in a sense for human rights here in Canada is related to Individuals living with a mental illness and comparing them to the highest standard, which Is the convention on the rights for persons with disabilities? So this next slide asks what did we do and more importantly How did we do it and these images are people that we worked with and their support networks and by the way These images you can find in a photo voice presentation on the Canadian Mental Health Association Winnipeg website and so there you'll see the pictures and more elaborate stories of what those pictures mean So that's the first thing in terms of what did we do is we formed a group of people across Canada who Experienced with mental illness and we asked them to share their stories and to define for us what is meant by the term human rights And we not only worked with these individuals But we also chose three provinces to focus on Manitoba, BC and Nova Scotia and in in these provinces We gathered information about their mental health legislation their policies and their standards and one of the methods we used to gather that information was to conduct focus groups in each of those provinces With people from government from non-government organizations people with lived experience and family members and We asked them to describe the current status of their legislation policies and standards against five key rights And those were access to justice liberty and security of the person Freedom from torture cruel inhuman integrating treatment or punishment Living independently in the community and access to physical and mental health treatment and services and we also Conducted interviews with individuals in Australia Scotland and the European Commission as they had also attempted to evaluate their laws against international human rights treaties So from all of that information gathering, what did we learn? And so What part of what we learned is depicted in these slides So you'll see a picture of an institution and you'll see a picture of chairs all in a row and you see a image of a Monopoly game where it's about chance or luck and these are some of the thoughts or Feedback we receive from people in terms of what their legislation policies and standards represented for them This is not to say I know that seems like a very negative picture It's not to say that there weren't positive things going on in the province provinces with respect to programs and services for people living with the mental illness but rather What we learned overall is that legislation policies and standards are not necessarily linked with each other and Above all, they are not Linked with key human rights that we find in the convention Furthermore, it is also commonly shared characteristic across the country that mental health legislation does not go much further Beyond establishing criteria for involuntary admission treatment or substitute decision-making So that existing legislation is focused largely on restricting people's rights or what some may refer to as negative rights Rather than on positive rights such as those we find in the CP CRPD like the right to live independently in the community including the right to choose Housing and the right to a range of in-home and community supports which we see in article 19 the right to employment and employment supports in article we see in article 27 the right to education and Education supports which is an article 24 and the right to an adequate standard of living and social protection our article 28 We found that there were several policies for mental health facilities regional District health authorities some promises had policies, but they seem to be more in reaction to events and They certainly didn't seem to be connected with the legislation and most definitely not connected with human rights Nova Scotia was the only province to have mental health standards Many services are accredited through accreditation standard of accreditation Canada But again those standards from accreditation Canada aren't linked to human rights So if we think of legislation and policy and standards as the pillars of A human rights framework those those aspects are there in Canada they exist But really when you apply the CRPD to them they They don't uphold or support the key human rights that we find in the commit convention So I have one minute. Okay real quick. Where do we go from here? back to basics So Keeping it simple in everything that we do all the meetings that we attend All the discussions like this we participate and Make sure that people that would lived experience are at the table and actively contributing Be inspired look at what the rest of the world is doing when I went to India And I was going through a psychiatric institution I saw people lying on the floors on the floor next to the beds, and I asked what's this about and It was the family members when when people are admitted to the institution the family members go with them So it's not necessarily we want to do that here, but it's it's how do we not break that connection between Individuals and their support systems We need to keep talking spread the word and raise CRPD in all the meetings and discussions you participate in and Evaluate I'm a big believer in evaluation and through this project We developed a tool that to evaluate legislation policies and standards. I encourage you to look at it It's on the mental health commissioner Canada website, and it's on the CMA chair Winnipeg website So use it to your hearts can take from it what you can chuck the rest But it's there for you for you to use. Thank you very much Thank you very much Christine for your presentation. It was very informative. I love the pictures and Your generosity of course appreciate that I'd like to invite Professor Sheila Wildman from the school at Shula floor to come to the podium All right, so my my topic this evening of 10-minute speed dates with the CRPD Is article 12? Equal legal capacity as I'm putting it and I have let me see here three Objectives first I want to take a look at what article 12 has to say about decision-making capacity and law Then I want to ask building on a core commitment of article 12 What it would mean to support equal legal capacity? What does this mean and finally briefly? I want to look very briefly at some examples of Nova Scotia law in light of article 12 And I conclude there that we have to quote my colleague Diane Pache and others miles to go So article 12 here is the text or an excerpt from the text of article 12 I provide the full text in the appendix to my slides that I understand will be available after this This session on the Schulich school website So the full text is there. What does it say? Well the two parts that I've excerpted I'm actually going to read them in part for people with visual impairments The first section I'm interested in states that states parties shall recognize that persons with disabilities enjoy equal legal capacity Sorry enjoy legal capacity on an equal basis with others in all aspects of life And the second part I want to look at states states parties shall take appropriate measures to provide access Bipersons with disabilities to the support they may require in exercising their legal capacity There's more to article 12 their statements about legal legal safeguards that are important in processes concerning legal capacity But I'm not going to look at those right now It's my colleague Archie Kaiser mentioned Canada has registered an interpretive Declaration and reservation that rejects explicitly rejects any interpretation of article 12 that would require the elimination Of all substitute decision-making regimes Sounds like quite a radical proposal But it's a proposal that was taken entirely seriously During the process that gave rise to this text and the text might look kind of bland because it's text But in fact behind it is a whole set of a whole set of dramas and fights That concerned the participation of persons with disabilities in the negotiation and drafting processes So these there's a lot going on behind this text and its interpretation and we can come back to Canada's reservation perhaps So article 12 is drafted against a background of laws Guardianship and substitute decision-making laws. We'll look at a couple examples briefly in a sec laws in many places including Nova Scotia That deprive one of decision-making authority and confer that authority on another. That's the substitute So these laws bring together on the one hand what I'm going to say are cognitive based based in ideas of what you can understand In in the main they bring together cognitive cognitive based standards or definitions of Capacity and incapacity and they wed those to models of substitute decision-making That's a lot to bring into one idea, but I'm going to come back to it I'm moving now to a slide that shows that I was once Archie Kaiser student and still am a member of his student Because this looks a bit like one of his slides I was and it also uses the term a paradigm shift which he used and many have Specifically to describe article 12 and its implications So it's often been said to require a paradigm shift from the reigning model of Substitute decision-making to a new model that's termed supported decision-making and this chart tries to capture the difference Between these so where on the left well, I should say left-hand side of that Where substitute decision-making models position some persons as lacking the internal capacity think of the word capacity to make Decisions and they respond to that by transferring decision-making authority from that person to another Supported decision-making models on the other side start with the idea that all decision-making requires Relationship sense of support institutional and other relationships of support and so against that background it aims to enable Direction or autonomy right the word for that within a framework of supports So the last little bit in that slide the last contrast goes to the what I would term the relational effects of these two models So whereas the substitute model has the effect of subjecting one to suspicion and Surveillance and ultimately coercion. This is a big package that I'm throwing together The alternative model of supportive decision-making is meant to enhance relationships of respect and empowerment So this sums up the point and it's the language used by representatives of a group called the world network of users and survivors of psychiatry and that was a key player key instrumental group among many others in assisting in the drafting of article 12 so what does this say it says instead of restricting autonomy of those who need extra support to comfortably Participate in all aspects of life the CRPD Particular article 12 requires states to provide access to those supports to the supports that are required Okay, so this slide I'm actually going to hate to know for but it's an image of some particular rabble rousers and you know Agitators involved in the CRPD process and the one on the top is a fellow who founded a group called mad pride in in Ireland And my point with this slide really just goes the title is political not biomedical And that's referring to both the nature of legal capacity in this paradigm shift And it refers to the kinds of the action that has to be taken in response To legal in capacity and what am I talking about? Well, let's move to Something maybe a little more practical. What would it mean to support decision-making capacity? And what's the state's role in this so quickly? this is just a partial list of Essential supports that have been recognized by many and they include well providing a range of meaningful options that actually enhances ones Autonomy and legal in legal capacity one might ultimately say housing options Treatment options other sorts of options and with something we have to unpack What else assistance under understanding and exploring those options as opposed to say, you know, all of us We've been in a doctor's office and here's the form that goes to your consent and this is all the stuff And you know, you just presume that you you understand or we really don't care if you do or not This actually goes to the need to to explain and make sure there is Understanding and that might involve a family member or a peer or state-provided assistant Assistants communicating a choice sometimes that is the difficulty And something I've written a little bit about goes to the need for crisis intervention because there are emotional and other Barriers to legal capacity in some cases or to decision-making ability. Let's put it that way Building relationships of trust in order to displace coercive Responses I'm actually going to skip over this slide Although it's my favorite because it tries to spiderweb out from legal capacity to the social and economic rights that are so key within The CRPD so there are broader structural and institutional societal supports that are necessary to support legal capacity How am I okay? Where am I okay? So a couple of examples Before I move to Nova Scotia quickly just two examples of legal models elsewhere that I'm calling here works in progress Around supporting capacity first British Columbia's Representation Agreement Act and this was looked at a lot even during the the drafting of article 12 What's supportive about it? Well, I've picked out a few things here One it stipulates Expressly that capacity shouldn't depend on one's way of communicating with others that seemed important from what we've seen so far second it allows one to Appoint someone to assist me right with making decisions as opposed to take over In specific areas it also allows me to appoint someone to take over in certain circumstances that this model does The the act also states a test for capacity to make those appointments That's not rooted in the sort of cognitive capacities of understanding and so on that traditional models are So it goes to one's ability to express preferences and trust It's so think about the relevance of this and this is why it was drafted this way as I understand it I'm two persons with intellectual disabilities. They don't have fluctuating capacity necessarily back and forth. It's a it's a it's it's a Standard that's intended to empower and give a certain legal authority to people based on Their way of expressing their agency that's my tip Last one requires substitute substitute decision-makers to respect people's current wishes Not just their prior capable wishes their current wishes if those are reasonable in the circumstances and there's much to impact Unpack there too quick caveat I have to add there's deep concerns about the fact that this act does not apply at going back to Christine's topic in cases of involuntary psychiatric Hospitalization in those cases patients are deemed to consent to their treatment. Is that equal legal capacity? second model from Sweden the personal ombudsman or PO and this is a state-funded alternative as I've put there to Family support and it's aimed at assisting the most Isolated and marginalized people. Oh shoot. Oh my gosh. I'm down to zero. All right I'm gonna move from that which is so important and I'm just gonna tell you we can come back to this in Conversation obviously where it was gonna go with our critique Exhibit one our guardianship act which goes to all or nothing Capacity or incapacity. There's nothing in it about supporting decision-making. There's nothing about attending to person's wishes and so on Exhibit two was he also are more limited substitute decision-making regimes in hospital and While these are perhaps a little bit better in their decision specificity again They don't address decision-making supports the involuntary psychiatric treatment act to have to make this point in light of equal legal capacity is one that Imposes a higher standard of decision-making capacity than even under the hospitals act Plus it's uniquely in Nova Scotia the situation where my best interests can override my prior capable wishes So a deep concern there and lastly in the community. We have separate substitute decision-making regimes that again Don't address decision-making support And there are other problems with them that we could talk about I'll leave you with the example of doctors Emergency room doctors who are being asked to assess people's capacity to decide about whether to enter a nursing home in The context of the emergency room and they're saying how do I have got this person under the fluorescent light? and they haven't eaten friend they're in a crisis and I'm actually deciding whether they're capable of Being of making the decision about entering long-term care Help me. What am I supposed to do? So I'll leave you with that and I Was gonna actually say thank you Thank you very much professor Wildman for your thought-provoking Presentation didn't she energize us and get us thinking and what do to go forward and do things I'd like to invite Anne McCrae to the podium and McCrae is the executive director for the first note Sorry disabled person's commission I don't have a PowerPoint so It's great to be here and I'm sitting in the front and didn't realize how many people there were here It's a great crowd and it's amazing to me because I look across the room and I see a lot of students Which is fantastic, but I also see a lot of people from different parts of my life here and Fantastic to see Some of the kids my son has gone to activities with here as well Let you know we're learning about the CRPD and they'll be kids who? Will grow up with never having not known the CRPD. So that's that's kind of exciting as well. I was asked to talk briefly about How some of us are using the CRPD here in Nova Scotia to try to move some issues forward and As Anne said, I'm the executive director of the disabled person's commission and we're a commission of the provincial government so we advise the provincial government on disability issues and we have a commission of 13 people eight of those are people with disabilities from across Nova Scotia and the other five represent government departments that Provide a lot of programs and services for persons with disabilities So in that case, you know, we in some ways we're exercising What I'm gonna talk about and that people with disabilities have the opportunity to be involved in in the political process in some way but I fundamentally believe that The only way we're ever gonna make any great strides around disability issues is when we see people with disability and decision-making Places and we have a fair ways to go before we're gonna see that but we're really Wanting to be involved in ensuring that people with disabilities have that Opportunity to participate in public and political life So I'm gonna talk a bit about what we've been doing around article 29 And I'm gonna read a bit about what article 29 is about and then I'll give you some examples of some of the work we're involved with So article 29, which is about participation in Political and public life and it states states parties shall Guarantee to persons with disabilities Political rights and the opportunity to enjoy them on an equal basis with others and shall undertake a To ensure that persons with disabilities can effectively and fully participate in Political and public life on an equal basis with others directly or through freely chosen representatives Including the right and opportunity for persons with disabilities to vote and be elected in Toralia by One ensuring that voting procedures facilities and materials are appropriate accessible and easy to understand and use Protecting the right of persons with disabilities to vote by secret ballot in elections and public referendums without intimidation and To stand for elections to effectively hold office and perform all public functions at all levels of government facilitating the use of assistive and new technologies where appropriate and Three guaranteeing the free expression of the will of persons with disabilities as electors and to this end Where necessary at their request allowing assistance and voting by a person of their own choice and be to promote actively an environment in which persons with disabilities can effectively and fully participate in the conduct of public affairs without discrimination and On an equal basis with others and encourage their participation in public affairs including I'm almost finished one participation in non-governmental Organizations and associations concerned with the public and political life of the country and in the activities and administration of political parties to forming and joining organizations of persons with disabilities to represent persons with disabilities at International national regional and local levels So it's quite specific about How we can ensure that people with disabilities can participate in public and political life? So some of the things we've done at the commission is we call we've collaborated collaborated with various organizations, but one in particular was the Nova Scotia League for equal opportunities back in 2010 was celebrating their 30th anniversary and we agreed to work together to put on an event where we would focus on article 29 and See what kinds of things we could do here in Nova Scotia to promote public and political participation of persons with disabilities and So what we did was we held a one-day forum and in the morning we brought people with disabilities together and we had an expert on this particular article Educate us about what it means and and and how we could Implemented here in Nova Scotia and then in the afternoon we brought together Governor-in-Chief officials people with disabilities elections Nova Scotia to actually talk about okay How do we start to realize this? article here in Nova Scotia and Out of that came several recommendations Two of them I'll speak to today and in terms of having been able to move some of it forward Organizations representing persons with disabilities and elections Nova Scotia work closely together to ensure that Changes were made to the elections act which would make it easier for people with disabilities to be involved in the political process and And they did they did change the election act to make it much more accessible to people with disabilities and secondly, there was a call for the creation of something that Women have through the advisory council on the status of women which was a campaign school for women and Wanted to see a similar campaign school okay, thanks Operative or organized for people with disabilities and we've had at least one meeting to start putting that in place and I put some money in my budget for next year, and so we're hoping if We get all our money. We'll be able to start working on Creating a campaign school for people with disabilities We've also been involved with some work at the municipal level Last year may recall that there were a series of workshops Held across the province to Encourage people from designated groups to participate in the municipal electoral process and we worked with those folks to Create a webinar that was fully accessible meaning People with disabilities who were deaf could participate. We had sign language interpreters on the webinar itself We had a caption and all of the documents were Provided in ultimate formats to people who wanted to participate and we held two sessions where people with disabilities could participate with Two session leaders To find out how they could participate more fully in the municipal electoral process and we're also now starting to also look at a Request came through to the commission to start looking at how we could Improve the participation of people with disabilities and school boards We know that there are some designated seats For people with disability sorry for other groups We know that there are seats designated for for other groups like African Nova Scotians and So we are starting to look at how can we ensure that people with disabilities have better access to Being involved on our school boards as well so that's just to give you some ideas of some of the work that It can be done in terms of taking a specific article and starting to Work towards progressive realization of what that standard could look like here in Nova Scotia. Thank you Feeling kind of guilty now Finish with three minutes to spare I'd like to thank you very much And you know one of the things that we can always count on and we've heard a lot of the theoretical aspect of the CRPD but and Is a very practical person very knowledgeable and So thank you very much and for for bringing that Making it so real for us as it applies to us here in Nova Scotia our next speaker This evening is Anna McCurry And it is the human rights officer for inclusion international Okay, good evening to follow up on Sheila's comment I'm the last speaker in our CRPD speed dating event and then we're gonna flip it over to you guys to hear from you If you have any questions or comments or things that you want to share and I would also like to thank all of you. There is a lot of you when you get up here it's great to see this big of a turnout and To follow up on Dave's comment about being part of a conversation that starts tonight and being part of a discussion here in Nova Scotia About this convention. I'm really honored to be here and thank Thank all of you for having me here as And mentioned my name is Anna. I'm a human rights officer with inclusion international and we are an International Federation that represents people with intellectual disabilities and their families our member here in Canada for those of you Who might not be familiar with inclusion international our member in Canada is the Canadian Association for Community Living and their Nova Scotian member is the Nova Scotia Association for Community Living, so it's nice actually to see some familiar faces in the audience as well and and what I'm going to talk about tonight is about community engagement and Really how you in this room and rooms like this around the country are going to make this convention real and meaningful Here in Nova Scotia here in Canada and hopefully around the world Probably the number one question I get asked particularly in countries like Canada that have very strong Human rights frameworks that have strong equality provisions in their legal frameworks is why should I care about this convention? And I think Archie did a great job at addressing a number of those questions And So there's a lot of reasons you should care about it You should care about it because of those reasons because of the reasons that our panelists have talked about you should care about it because of the Legal obligations it creates in this country and around the world But also I think it's important when we look at the what of community engagement and talk about community engagement The why part and why you should care also links back to the community engagement question The convention itself was an exercise in community engagement from the very outset and again Archie and some others Steve others have Touched on this tonight from the beginning in this convention was a participatory process We had by the last negotiating session there was more than 800 civil society organizations and individuals accredited in New York at the United Nations Being part of these negotiations It was the first time in history that people affected by a convention were that involved in the negotiations of its Of the convention and really I think for the first time This convention pulled international human rights law out of the sole domain of lawyers and diplomats For the first time this convention was inclusive of the voice of people that were impacted by those laws It was informed directly by people with disabilities and by families It was informed by that lived experience and that was the expertise that was brought to bear in making this convention What it is today that community engagement shaped the convention that we have Sheila had mentioned some of the challenges around Article 12 community engagement I think is often seen as this lovely kumbaya moment where we all come together and hold hands and say yeah Let's do this it's wonderful and there was a lot of those moments But more than that there was a lot of fights and that's equally important with community engagement is making sure That you're able to fight through those issues and work together on things that are really hard trying to resolve Centuries of guardianship legislation is really hard You need to have all those voices at the table even when you're fighting with each other You're going to get to a better place at the end of that So the convention is different from the beginning the convention was so involved and so developed by community It is that voice of community that has shaped it So I think it's important that we use that experience to reflect on how do we now make it real and meaningful as we transition into Implementation at a domestic and international level What's going to make the difference and for me and I think many people would agree it's going to be the voice of community It's going to be people who care people who are going to speak up That's what's going to make conventions like this real in our communities. So to touch a little bit Around that. How do you do that? Well, we're already doing it. We got the convention this far You can see a huge community engagement effort here in Nova Scotia Back when Canada announced so it was the convention was adopted by the United Nations in December of 2006 and it was opened for signature in March of 2007 and Canada much to the surprise of many of us said, oh, you know what? We're not going to show up We're not going to be there. It's too hard. We got to talk to people. We got to go to the provinces We can't make that happen Collectively the community stood up and said that's not okay. Canada was a leader in developing this Canada has to be there to sign at the time the Minister of Foreign Affairs was Peter McKay Here in Nova Scotia his office was inundated with faxes with emails with phone calls with people who've got in their cards and drove Distellerton and said bud, this isn't going to work. You have to make this happen and that level of pressure was Very successful and they did it Canada showed up So that community engagement has already made a difference here in Nova Scotia and here in Canada So moving forward from that What's happening right now? Many of you may not know you are sitting in Halifax Which as far as I know is the only city in the entire country that has a mayor that explicitly expressed a commitment to the convention So what are we doing about that? What are we doing to help him make that commitment real? What are we doing to hold him accountable to that commitment? We have a role in making that happen. That's our community engagement It's easy to sit back and say this is what government has to do you got to do this We need to be the ones at the table pushing this to happen as well So what are some things that you can do practically use it? Use the convention in all of the efforts that you are involved in it's a legal tool for sure But it's an information tool. It's an advocacy tool We need to be the ones to give meaning to these words if you haven't already read it. I highly recommend it It's fantastic read even if it is a very legal document You can write to the Department of Heritage and they will mail you a handy-dandy little copy of it Which is another great way of letting the Department of Heritage Know that people care about this that we're watching that we want to know what's going on Frame your issues through the convention So if you are involved in fighting for education and you are trying to get kids with disabilities into schools frame that within article 24 If you are talking about legal capacity issues frame that within article 12 You may not be involved in the disability community. So if you're working on Justice issues, what are you doing to ensure that article 13 of the convention on access to justice is being part of your work? So we need to be the ones framing our issues in the language of the convention and really using that framework to advance our issues Build it into your newsletters into your presentations into your conferences Make sure that you're doing what you can to raise awareness about it as mentioned You've got incredible expertise here in this community Steve Estee was on the Canadian delegation Dulcy McCallum was on the Canadian delegation many of us were in New York throughout the negotiating sessions There's lots of resources that people would love to help share information about and raise that awareness Participate in monitoring and reporting This is and I'm sure I'm down to like zero minutes at this point And but this I'll end on this one because it's probably the most important thing that we can do as a community And again, it was touched on a little bit by Archie and some others We have a responsibility to Engage in Monitoring and reporting on this the government has an obligation to make sure we are involved in that But I can tell you governments around the world and certainly here in Canada would be more than happy for us to ignore this convention We need to be the ones who are pushing it forward We need to be the ones that are demanding that we be included and one way we can do that is through parallel reports Canada has its famous Non-existent report that it owes to a committee of international experts That same committee will also take reports from community. So they will take They prefer to have coalitions preferably at a national level But they want to hear what communities are saying their governments or the country that they're reviewing is up to Canada's report I guarantee you is going to be a lovely long long laundry list about all the great things that they're doing We can help the committee develop the core questions They need to be asking to get a real understanding of what's happening for people with disabilities in Canada Use it to form a domestic analysis. There's incredible work going on right now around the world about using the convention to analyze budgets Politicians around the world love talking about what they're going to do The way you're going to find out what they're actually doing is by looking at the budget Take the convention and do an analysis of your provincial budget of a federal budget And you can use that to hold that government to account Use it domestically here in Nova Scotia to do a report card is Nova Scotia living up to the standards in these convention in this convention Lastly participate in a global exchange of knowledge We cannot let our broken service delivery model be our legacy or our main export People are looking to Canada. They are looking to us to lead the way and to show solutions We need to be honest that we're struggling and that we need to be doing things better And we need to be learning from countries that are doing things in new and innovative ways as well So I will leave it at that and just say thank you very much I'm excited to be part of this dialogue and I really appreciate being here this evening Thank you ever so much. We really appreciate your presentation this evening now We're going to do a little bit of moving around and quickly get our Participants our panel members up onto the platform here. We've got ten minutes for questioning so And it was kind of she was right a speed dating this year PDP speak Well, I think we'd have had half the crowd if it was a three or four questions here and hopefully Ian can hear me and The first question I have for our panel members this evening This is a question that was emailed to us whilst you're settling in I Would like to ask the question of the panel Panem's Response to the following I'm a sufferer of MCS multiple chemical sensitivity in addition to other environmental sensitivities that impede my physical well-being and create virus to my full participation in society I Understand that under the laws I should be treated as any other person disabled person But this has not been the case for me. I'm frequently told that my needs can't be accommodated What should I expect under the law when it comes to accommodation for me and others with environmental sensitivities Okay, who's going to take that? I'll say something feel free to disagree with me if you like But it brings up an interesting point for me this question Archie made reference to the idea of a definition of disability in the convention and there was a lot of debate and a lot of discussion around a Specific definition of disability and if you actually look at the placement of the discussion around defining disability It's in the preambular text of the convention that they talk about that So it's not in a binding piece of the convention It's in the preamble and if you look at the place in the convention where it does offer definitions Specific definition of disability is not placed there What is placed instead there is a definition of discrimination based on disability And I think that that's a very important distinction that these kind of question lies open Because we sat in a room talking about the convention and talking about definition and many people Bang their fists on the table and said you can't have a convention that doesn't define the group of people that you're talking about but other people talked about the fact that Disability is an evolving concept and and that's the thing that we tried to talk about there So these sort of question I think lies open some of the Challenges that the people who drafted the convention faced when we were when we were doing that work So that's my non-answer to the question anybody else If we can be as briefly as we possibly can because we'd also like to take a couple from the audience Well, I guess what I would say is that article one refers to the following Concept it tells you what persons with disabilities includes and it says it includes persons who have long-term physical mental Intellectual or sensory impairments which in interaction with various barriers may hinder their full and effective participation in society on an equal basis So to the extent that a person with multiple chemical sensitivities would have a long-term physical impairment where in interaction with barriers that their in their participation is Obstructed then I would have thought on the face of it that that that does count like the kind of disability that's protected from discrimination under the convention and You know, there is a duty to provide reasonable accommodations which don't impose a disproportionate or undue burden on The situation where the person is trying to fully participate. So on the face of it Would appear to me to be another kind of disability that requires accommodation And can I add one last thing which is my understanding is that the Canadian Human Rights Commission as well as the Ontario Human Rights Commission And our Human Rights Commission as I understand it here in Nova Scotia hasn't recognized environmental Sensitivities as a form of disability requiring accommodations. So it perhaps the question goes to the Deeper problem perhaps even deeper problem of how one makes that right Real which I suppose is something we're all thinking about Thank you very much. Yes Are there any questions from the audience this evening? Yes, please. They are too Can you speak as loudly as you possibly can? Okay, and did you hear that question given that there has been some limitations to have the UN conventions adapted into our own Laws is our government doesn't seem to have the appetite to do that. Am I making that statement clear? So they don't have a legal requirement to do it, but okay but The article I'm not used to using this in this classroom But anyway the the article that we have all referred to as article 4 that imposes general obligations on states parties And it requires states parties including Canada and all of its provincial and territorial entities to adopt all appropriate legislative measures for implementation to take measures to modify or abolish existing laws which are inconsistent and To take this into account deeply in all policies and programs So there's a clear legal obligation to adopt that Canada has accepted by being a state's party So I think what that means is that that needs to be constantly played back to governments That that's the undertaking that you know They have solemnly made and they're in breach of the convention if they don't so I think the convention is meant to be used as a tool to beat government into submission and to protect To protect the human rights of persons with disabilities So that you know, I think it's an advocacy tool as well as a legal obligation I'm glad we have the minister here tonight, and I won't beat him into submission But that is the obligation of the government of Nova Scotia looking right at you. Let it And I think if my CEO hadn't turned in is my key probably would have Said that we at the Nova Scotia Human Rights Commission We are trying to adopt and live the the convention as best as we can and educate the public about the convention and just to add briefly to that Canadian law tends to really appreciate the moral authority of UN conventions if you look there was a great paper done quite a while ago now around references to the convention on the rights of children in In judgments that that came through the Supreme Court and I think a few provincial level courts as well And what we have found is judges really do like hearing them and just as an example there was the gray case in Ontario that was looking at Closing the last three institutions in Ontario for people with intellectual disabilities and the convention was in fact still under negotiation Had not had final text so certainly hadn't been signed or ratified by anyone and the ruling judge referenced the convention and referenced at the time was article 15 Which eventually became article 19 on the right to live and be included in the community as the justification for closing the institution So I think that we've seen even though it may not have same domestic force of law. It certainly has moral influence on law Okay, I'm David. Is there anything that you want to add to this? Thank you very much David. I'm very conscious of our time and the person at the other end who conducts our cart Has to has to leave us. He's currently in BC. So Could I believe I believe that we could we could go further I had the sanction from Elizabeth Sanford in light of that as well to go until as late as quarter to okay So how long people have the appetite? Wonderful. Thank you very much in that case. There's a question here Yeah, I just had one thing to the question that was that was just I I think also Here Nova Scotia the provincial government is it's currently involved in and working with the disability community around the development of a disability framework and there's about 10 initiatives that are currently underway in which governments ensuring that the Issues that affect people with disabilities will be What's the word I'm looking for will be, you know seriously looked at to ensure that under those initiatives that people with disabilities will be provided for and the CRPD is is is is critical to that work and Working with the disability community We're ensuring that in each of these initiatives, you know those articles that relate to the CRPD will be will be well Understood by government and will be you know implemented. We hope so That's another way that the CPR CRPD is being utilized right now here in Nova Scotia I have to add one quick word and then I know we have to get to another question and that goes to guardianship laws There have been calls to reform our guardianship law in Nova Scotia forever So it seems there was a bit of paper done by the Law Reform Commission in the 90s at some point early on saying that we Should reform this antiquated bill the incompetent persons act as it's called and we made a reform to get rid of reference to lunatics I think and change that word, but we've not Substantively reformed the bill so maybe the CRPD provides a new incentive to revisit this intractable Regine, thank you, and we have a question here, and then I'll come to you You still interested a lady to work. Yeah. Yes. Are you still? I'm sorry. I apologize Can I ask and to answer that question, please and McCrae It's It's a really good. It's a really good question pot I think we need to do the same sort of things that we're doing on some of the other articles is to take that article and to form committees or to form groups To get government at the table as well and to start talking to them about okay. This is what this article says We understand its progressive realization, but we need to start making some real serious progress on this and What are we going to do and I think you know that it takes Community it takes government at the table and And Anna said earlier, you know, we all have a role to play to realize what these articles mean I think the work that we the model that we used when we started working on article 29 was an interesting one And I and I think it can be replicated for any one of these articles We had you know Somebody come in who understood how the article had been implemented elsewhere To talk about and educate us as a community about what that article means and how it can be implemented and then we had We brought all the various players together to actually talk about what are some of the things that we would like to do here in Nova Scotia to realize this and I know it's not going to happen overnight But if we continuously raise it and continuously say, okay in terms of article 29, this is what we want to do How would Scott? How are you as a government gonna? implement it The same process can be used for any article I don't know if you have to form another group, but I think you bring those interested people that are interested in that specific Article together and start working together. It doesn't have to be a formal group per se It could be through the disability strategy partnership group if you wanted it could be through a coalition of groups that that that that that requires technical aid You know it can be done in a variety of ways, but but I think you know we can We can utilize these specific articles to I think really start moving some of these issues forward that have been as you've said And I would like to make a comment Just Musical chairs to get everyone to fit and I think to add to that a real key feature to the convention is That it's different from any other human rights treaty It doesn't just say you have a right to employment or you have a right to education It goes through the conditions that are necessary to make those rights real and meaningful Which I think is why we finally are able to have a rights drip rights driven conversation about access to supports and services and Inclusion international just completed and launched a global report on the right to live and be included in the community and the number one thing that We heard from people around the world is they don't have the supports that they need to do it So I think that it's as and saying not necessarily forming a new coalition But it is about looking more broadly The access to supports and services what we're providing and again one of the things that we found in our report pretty consistently around the World is what we're doing isn't working and we need to do a fundamental rethink of what we as Organizations are providing in terms of the supports and access to devices that we're doing and sitting down with governments and really doing a Rethink of where we are and what we're providing because what that what we've been doing to date hasn't been working So I think it is using the convention as our springboard into a whole new Conversation and really looking more broadly at the supports and services aides and devices that are needed to facilitate full inclusion and participation Thank you very much. I've got three questions to take And I just want to make sure I'm not ignoring this side of the room so that would be four questions one two three Four okay in that order, so please Individual My question might be pretty specific There are deaf and hard of hearing children and when they're Born the parents are asking, you know, what do I do with my deaf or my hard of hearing child? It's better to give them the cochlear implant. It's better to Better to Teach them, you know how to speak to be oral and You know under the UN convention They have a right to their first language So if they're born deaf or born hard of hearing They should be taught both Whether it's American Sign Language or what what not assigned language and learned how to speak and in Sweden their model that is Child is born deaf or hard of hearing There's a team that comes in that teaches that children and that that child and that family to sign right away and that support is provided which is Awesome, that's a great model and The parents and the child are You know less frustrated because they can communicate with each other and I guess my question if we want something like that here Where do we start? Okay, who would like to respond? Archie go ahead. Did you okay? You were looking for someone as well. I mean, I think that you make it, you know, exactly the right Point, you know, that's to be brought home to government And you've stated that the case very emphatically I suppose that the right place to start is to put pressure on the minister who's Responsible for everything from the provision of medical services to community supports or the ministers and say that you know for Children born deaf or hard of hearing they need these kinds of dual supports and use the convention as a way of Ensuring that government would have to tell you that they don't care if they're in breach of international human rights law Put them in that position by using the text of the convention directly I think you've made a brilliant argument Thank you Any further? I would say very directly don't let him out of the room Again just in terms of framing it within the context of the convention, I would frame that within article 23 on supports to families Certainly looking at article 6 on children And there's a preamble comment about supports to families as well and of course Make sure you're engaging with the minister in the room But minister of community and social services and minister of health are probably yeah should be equally on your horizon I guess I have a quick question Back to you how? How well would you say the deaf community is? Aware of the convention and how it can be used here and try to Disperse it throughout the community so We're trying like the deaf community doesn't really have a lot of accessibility if we need We need a group to really focus on the deaf community and like Maybe it's a hearing person with interpreters or deaf people given presentations I really don't think the deaf community fully understands the CRPD so but related to you our article 29 The inclusion of community like the deaf community generally that doesn't apply to them. There's too many barriers. There's Communication alone is too much of a barrier interpreting services. There's just not enough interpreters Education is another factor. So it really depends. So I'm just going to leave it here, but so I think the He's used to this I Think the first thing we should do is is is make sure that we have some information sessions with the deaf community so that they fully understand how The convention that they how they can use a convention to forward their issues and and then go from there Yeah We've got five minutes left I'm going to take the question here and as I said the one to the back So I'd like us to be as brief as possible because There's no caption there at all there needs to be some legal teeth here and What is our recourse, you know, we need to have something simple to The energy Okay, is there anybody who would like to respond to that I'd like to say that there are 156 of us in this room and you know, that's a powerful voice Of a hundred and six to six individual is not it just doesn't take one it takes a community It takes all of us human rights is about all of us taking responsibility for each other. So Let's think about that any of our panel members Okay, I'll move on to question at the back One thing I will say is that very sadly Canada has not signed the optional protocol To the convention on the rights of persons with disabilities which would enable individuals and groups of individuals to complain directly to the United Nations I don't know why we haven't except you know as a country I guess we're afraid of the convention actually being used effectively by people like you It's a deep shame I think for this country that that we haven't signed the optional protocol Which would facilitate at the UN the receipt of communications just like the one you've brought to us Thank you the question are you still interested in Sometimes Okay Now we've got our legal minds here and a lot of contribution can I'm gonna out the Nova Scotia Commission a little bit and Suggest that there is an effort underway of looking at how to harness that voice here in Nova Scotia and developing a parallel report So parallel reports or community reports or shadow reports Whatever you want to call them are a way that a community can pull its voice together and and sort of say the the realities of people on the ground and One of the real values in that is the committee then reviews that report and when Canada is Being reviewed before the committee The committee can ask specific questions and say what about this situation in Nova Scotia Or what about X Y or Z and they can do that regardless of whether or not we've signed the optional protocol So that point is incredibly important one of the challenges is that the committee is already estimated three to five years behind in their Their whole review process one of the reasons Canada has stated that they have not signed the optional protocol is that the system for reviewing treaty body obligations is So backlogged and so delayed there is a review underway and they would rather wait and and engage at that time I often think that that's a genuine answer. I often think there are some challenges of Not wanting to be held to account But I think that the The committee is very limited in its resources. It wants cross-disability reports. It prefers national reports So the the double challenge for community engagement is not only how do we harness what's happening here in Nova Scotia? How do we then link that into a Canadian report that can go to the committee? And as I mentioned the Commission and maybe Anne might talk a bit about this Is looking at least at taking on that Nova Scotia part Which also has great domestic uses in lobbying and and calling on your own government to be doing things here in Nova Scotia Yes, I know I was we are CEO would say that we're trying our best to to begin to to start just doing some work around Engaging with our community and and gathering some of that information My colleague here Jill has spent the entire Summer looking at shadow reports to get an understanding of how we can begin to make that kind of contribution and we've been guided by Steve Estay in in his work as to how to take it forward. So we we're trying our best We're trying to look at it, but it's going to take time and resource and we probably need a body We've also estimated how much it would cost us to actually Produce a report and if I'm not mistaken to to do a task like this for about two years It will cost us about a hundred thousand dollars to have a staff member So there's somebody here who wants to do it. So if anybody wants to volunteer to pay her Seriously, I'm not making slight of it. It's just that we've done some initial Inquiry into and review other reports into how we the Commission can do this now our time is going But I really do want to take the question from here Can you repeat the question and The cut the cut we can't get the question from cart so can I is this gonna can you rephrase the question and so that Steve I think she's making reference to I Just had a question about the involvement of photo studies and photography to do with the expression of live experiences among Mental health issues and non-physical disabilities. Mm-hmm. It was a photo. It was called a photo voice. So In our case we we gave Cameras to the individuals that we were working with people with lived experience and and they took images pictures in their communities of what Human rights meant to them and then they interpreted it through their stories So if you take a look on the website of CMHA Winnipeg, you'll see how it's depicted and Because we all are impacted in different ways some of us from the written word Some of us visually and and quite often images are more powerful Then the written word and we really found that to be a valuable part of our project That people could relate to better than our two-inch final report, right? You know, it says in a very few seconds what it means to Be constrained or confined or not free Thank you I'd like to Say a heartfelt. Thank you to our panelists this evening for a contribution to this very important topic And I'll also like to thank you for for being our audience tonight We have learned a great deal from each other and hope we will continue to have this dialogue and work Together with each other. Thank you very much