Sunday 4 January 2009

Government to Cripple UN Disabled Rights Convention

Britain has been criticised by a select committee of MPs for its failure to ratify the UN Convention on disability rights, which sets out to guarantee equal treatment for disabled people. The government says it is seeking several opt-outs from the convention and hopes to ratify the convention - or bits of it, at any rate - by Spring, but has provided scant detail about its reservations.
The Joint Select Committee on Human Rights also voiced its disappointment at the government's failure to adequately consult - or even inform - the disabled about which rights it felt were too good for them.
However, the government responded by pointing out that the government was very sympathetic towards the disabled.
"Look at our record," said a spokesman. "What other country is led by a man with so many physical and mental disabilities? Gordon Brown is blind to his own faults, deaf to criticism, and has a chronic difficulty in learning from his mistakes. His face is paralysed into a permanent scowl, he has a complete lack of empathy with ordinary people, he is totally unable to understand the consequences of his actions, and he has constructed a bizarre delusional fantasy in his head in which he has single-handedly saved the world. Despite all of this, he has - purely by his own efforts, because nobody actually wanted him - risen to the exalted position of prime minister. Britain is clearly a fantastic country in which to be disabled - who needs rights anyway?"

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