Response to the National Care Service (Scotland) Bill

In October 2020, the Commission published a report on the impact of COVID-19 on social care which highlighted not only the detrimental impact of the measures taken in the wake of the pandemic on the human rights of those using social care, but also longstanding problems within the system which resulted in failures to realise people’s human rights in practice.1 The Commission welcomed the Feeley Re. [...] It will seek to incorporate the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, along with the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination. [...] Incorporation of these treaties (and the Convention on the Rights of the Child which has already passed the Bill stage) will bring with them legally enforceable requirements to ensure the realisation of the human rights they contain. [...] The UN Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities has elaborated on the specific requirements of the right in its General Comment no 5 on Article 192 (GC5), which aims to assist States in the implementation of Article 19 and to fulfil their obligations under the Convention. [...] The principle should be more explicitly grounded in the right to independent living with the addition of the language “to realise their right to live independently and participate in the community” This is in line with the Feeley Review, which recommended that the purpose of social care make explicit reference to independent living.5 Section 1(e): This section requires that “opportunities are to b.