Foundations European Consortium by the European Foundation Centre – Disability Interest Group

The Foundation is a member of the Disability Interest Group of the European Foundation Centre, being also part of the European Consortium on Human Rights and Disabilities since 2008. The main purpose of the Consortium is the concerting of efforts of the foundations for action to raise awareness of the Community institutions, national governments, industry foundations and other relevant partners to the importance of the implementation of the European Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, in force since 2008 and ratified by Portugal in 2009, as well as support the task force of the recently created European Disability Strategy 2010-2020.

In 2012, as part of the Consortium, the Foundation supported two studies: “Evaluation of the impact of the austerity plans of European governments on the rights of persons with disabilities”, which presents some of the results of the cuts in social support for people with disabilities, particularly with regard to social support services and subsidies or pensions to support these people in six European countries (Portugal, United Kingdom, Greece, Hungary, Ireland and Spain), and the “International Study on the Implementation of the Convention of Rights of Persons with Disabilities” conducted by the ESSL Foundation in 2012 in about 50 countries, including Portugal, which focuses on three types of indicators: social indicators, indicators on innovative practices and indicators on innovation policies.