Report on the right to housing of persons with disabilities
Author
Special Rapporteur on the right to adequate housing
Presented
To the UN General Assembly at its 72nd session (October 2017)
Background
Around the world, the right to housing—a place to live in dignity and security, and to be included in community life with access to services and supports—remains beyond reach for most persons with disabilities. Action to realize and protect the right to housing for persons with disabilities have been largely ignored by legislative and policy initiatives globally.
Summary
The report considers how the “disability human rights paradigm” developed through the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities breathes life into the right to adequate housing. The Special Rapporteur highlights fundamental principles of a human rights approach to disability, such as dignity, substantive equality, accessibility and participation, as well as the over-riding obligation to realize the right to housing to the maximum of available resources, and correlates them to the key features of the right to adequate housing. She reflects on how persons with disabilities can more effectively claim the right to housing, how courts and tribunals can better address it, and reviews some effective policy and legislative initiatives that are necessary to implement this right.
The Special Rapporteur provides coherent framework to guide governments in the implementation of rights under articles 2 and 11 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and articles 19 and 28 of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and other obligations under international human rights law.
The report concludes with key recommendations highlighting the transformative potential of the disability human rights paradigm and how it must be better harnessed in order to realize the right to housing of persons with disabilities in accordance with commitments of the Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development.
Read the report in all six UN languages
Methodology
The Special Rapporteur circulated a questionnaire inviting States, local authorities and civil society to send information for the preparation of the report.
Questionnaire in English (Word | PDF) | Français (Word | PDF) | Español (Word | PDF)
Inputs Received
States
Non-Member State
National Human Rights Institutions
Responses from Civil Society Organisations
Individuals
