What changed between the plenary report and the adopted text

79. Calls on the Commission to publish EU guidelines to foster the development of high-quality family-centred early childhood intervention services, which are key to preventing segregation and foster inclusion for the next generation;

80. Stresses that persons with disabilities must be able to participate fully in cultural life not only as audiences, but also as creators, including as both amateur and professional artists; urges the Commission and the Member States to fully recognise and promote the creative contributions of artists with disabilities when designing and implementing relevant EU funding programmes; supports increased access to audiovisual services and content across the EU through a more harmonised and ambitious approach to implementing the accessibility provisions of the Audiovisual Media Services Directive;

81. Calls on the Commission to thoroughly research, monitor and assess the impact of algorithms deployed by large digital platforms on persons with disabilities, and to ensure the effective implementation of the relevant provisions of the Digital Services Actto tackle addictive and self-destructive algorithmic content, particularly where it disproportionately affects persons with disabilities; underlines the importance of including targeted measures for persons with disabilities in future legislative initiatives during this term, such as the upcoming action plan against cyberbullying and the digital fairness act; calls further on the Commission and the Member States to strengthen digital literacy and promote critical online awareness among persons with disabilities;

82. Insists that the Commission’s new Guidance on independent living and inclusion in the community in the context of EU funding be referenced in the funding regulations for the next multiannual financial framework, particularly the ESF+, the European Regional Development Fund and the Common Provisions Regulation;

83. Warns against the replication of institutional practices in community settings, or the replacement of large-scale institutional settings with smaller ones where the conditions for independent living and inclusion in the community are not met; stresses, in this regard, the importance of flexibility, choice, participation and inclusion of persons with disabilities as defining criteria for quality services; recommends that Member States establish clear national quality standards for care and support services, with a robust inspection system and outcome-based evaluation mechanisms;

84. Recognises the significant physical, mental and social benefits of sports for persons with disabilities and calls for the inclusion of persons with disabilities in sporting activities at all levels, from amateur to elite, to the fullest extent possible; calls on the Commission and the Member States to promote the development and accessibility of adapted sports by supporting inclusive sporting infrastructure, training of specialised staff and the participation of persons with disabilities;

85. Welcomes, in this regard, the Commission Guidance on independent living and inclusion in the community of persons with disabilities in the context of EU funding; calls on the Commission to launch an open method of coordination on deinstitutionalisation in order to move towards the development of common approaches to achieve the objectives outlined in the Guidance and assess the national measures adopted following the Council conclusions on enhancing community-based support and care for independent living;

86. Calls on the Commission to propose EU-level guidelines to support Member States in introducing high-quality standards for care settings, in line with the principles of dignity, safety and respect for human rights, not only covering the adequacy and accessibility of physical facilities, but also ensuring sufficient and well-trained staff, safe working conditions and person-centred care practices;

87. Calls on the Commission to issue a recommendation that all Member States align their national laws with the UNCRPD; calls for the EU and the remaining Member States who have not yet done so to ratify the UNCRPD Optional Protocol to allow for an individual complaints mechanism and better monitoring of the UNCRPD’s implementation;

89. Recalls that the Council recommendation of December 2022 on early childhood education and care recommends that the Member States introduce targeted measures to increase participation in early childhood education and care of children with disabilities and support training programmes for early childhood education and care staff to ensure the provision of high-quality services for children with disabilities; regrets that the measures put in place by the Member States have not yet resulted in the closure of the participation gap in early childhood education and care between children with disabilities and the overall population of children; considers that the accessibility of high-quality early childhood education and care for children with disabilities is necessary for their overall development and for their parents to re-enter the labour market;

Equal access and non-discrimination

90. Recognises the challenges faced by women and girls with disabilities and notes that women with disabilities face higher rates of violence against women and cyber and domestic violence including cases of forced sterilisation, forced abortion and physical restraint; calls on all EU Member States to ratify the Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence;

91. Calls on the Commission and the Member States to prioritise the prevention of gender-based violence against women with disabilities, both offline and online, in future legislation and strategies, including cases of forced sterilisation; calls on the Commission, in this regard, to criminalise the forced sterilisation of persons with disabilities with no exception based on disability or legal capacity, and to ensure equal access to sexual and reproductive healthcare, justice and compensation for victims;

92. Emphasises the need to ensure full access to justice for persons with disabilities through effective procedural accommodations, including but not limited to the provision of sign language interpretation, video testimony, documents in Braille and easy-to-read formats, and improved training for judicial and legal personnel; calls for strengthened legal awareness, aid and guidance for particularly vulnerable victims of crime, including children, women and older persons with disabilities, through accessible information both online and offline, including dedicated websites and information leaflets;

93. Emphasises the importance of promoting equal opportunities for women with disabilities, including supporting initiatives aimed at improving their access to leadership and decision-making roles across all sectors, so that the value of their work is also fairly recognised and rewarded in higher positions; calls on the Commission and the Member States to invest in accessible, inclusive and targeted EU-wide learning tools and training programmes specifically designed to support leadership development among women with disabilities, taking into account intersecting barriers and ensuring availability in accessible formats (e.g. Braille, sign language, easy-to-read, etc.);

94. Calls on the Commission and the Member States to address the invisibility of violence against women and girls with disabilities, particularly those with intellectual, cognitive or psychosocial disabilities; recalls that under Directive (EU) 2024/1385 on combating violence against women, Member States are required to provide specific support for women with disabilities who are victims of violence, to take into account their specific circumstances when assessing their protection needs, recognising the intersection between certain forms of violence against women such as female genital mutilation and disability, and to take targeted preventive measures in accessible formats in order to prioritise the prevention of violence against women with disabilities, both offline and online, in future legislation and strategies;

95. Emphasises that persons with disabilities are at higher risk of being the victims of hate speech and hate crime; welcomes the Commission proposal to extend the list of EU crimes to hate speech and hate crime; urges the Council to take measures in order to reach an outcome on this process;

96. Recalls the need to give visibility to the rights of women with disabilities and their role as active participants in society; emphasises the importance of promoting equal opportunities for women with disabilities, including supporting initiatives aimed at improving their access to leadership and decision-making roles across all sectors, so that the value of their work is fairly recognised and rewarded in higher positions; calls on the Commission and the Member States to actively promote the political participation of women with disabilities by removing structural barriers, ensuring accessibility in electoral and decision-making processes, supporting leadership training and fostering inclusive representation in political parties, institutions and advisory bodies;

97. Calls on the Commission and the Member States to address, at EU level, the barriers to accessing high-quality healthcare and care services for women in all their diversity, including barriers faced by women and girls with disabilities; notes with concern that persons with disabilities, including women and girls with disabilities, face barriers to accessing comprehensive healthcare and violations of their equal right to healthcare; calls on the Commission to make progress on its commitment to provide guidance to the Member States on equal access to healthcare, including sexual and reproductive healthcare, for persons with disabilities, based on inclusive, accessible and person-centred healthcare, free and informed consent as announced in the strategy, as well as mental health, gynaecological care, perinatal support and support in crisis situations, such as domestic violence;

98. Calls on the Commission and the Member States to strengthen their efforts to address discrimination faced by women with disabilities, who continue to face high unemployment rates and lower pay;

99. Highlights the role of the media in increasing the representation of persons with disabilities, their rights and perspectives, and spreading disability-sensitive messages, which can contribute to raising public awareness about disabilities and, in particular, about the skills and capabilities of persons with disabilities; supports inclusive and accessible communication campaigns that focus on the promotion of inclusion, diversity and equality around disability issues, both general and specific in scope, as regards less known disabilities such as deafblindness; stresses that without such awareness, persons with disabilities can face barriers and feel invisible in their communities and social environments, thus affecting their participation therein; encourages the development of awareness-raising campaigns at national and EU level to combat harmful stereotypes and prejudices about disabilities that also affect women with disabilities, with an emphasis on empowering messages and representation, and greater visibility in the media;

100. Recalls the Commission’s commitment to launch a study to evaluate the implementation of Article 30 of the UNCRPD to support Member States in developing policies to increase the participation of and support for persons with disabilities in sports, culture, art and leisure activities;

101. Stresses the need to continue strengthening the protection of persons with disabilities against discrimination by facilitating access to equality bodies and ensuring the implementation of relevant provisions of the directives on standards for equality bodies;

Support for the families and carers of persons with disabilities

102. Recognises that persons with disabilities, in particular those with complex support needs, may rely on their families to provide daily care and support, especially when there is a lack of available services in their community; acknowledges the fundamental and often invisible role played by families, in particular parents and other informal carers – disproportionally women in both cases – in providing daily care and support to persons with disabilities;

103. Highlights the importance of developing robust systems for independent living support, including personal assistance schemes, so that persons with disabilities are not solely reliant on family members for care and can live autonomously; calls for targeted support for young and young adult carers, including access to equitable educational arrangements, mental health services and formal recognition of their caregiving responsibilities to prevent social and educational exclusion;

104. Calls for an EU strategy on the transition from institutions to community-based care that includes family, in order to finalise the process of shifting the provision of care from institutions to community-based services that promote independent living, in line with the UNCRPD;

105. Stresses the need to support and recognise the essential role played by caregivers and families in the lives of persons with disabilities, including by addressing the specific needs of informal carers; calls on all Member States to fully and effectively implement Directive (EU) 2019/1158 on work-life balance for parents and carers, ensuring adequate leave, flexible working arrangements and social protections for caregivers; emphasises the gender dimension of caregiving and calls for policies that promote gender equality in care roles, including measures to ensure that caregiving responsibilities are more equally shared between caregivers;

106. Recognises, furthermore, the fundamental role of professionals in the care and support sector – including personal assistants, support workers, social workers, nurses and other front-line care staff – in enabling persons with disabilities to live with dignity and autonomy in the community; highlights also the urgent need to ensure that families and informal carers are supported through access to high-quality respite care services, enabling them to rest, work and participate fully in social life without compromising the health, stability or well-being of the persons with disabilities they support;

107. Recalls that both the EU and the Member States should step up their efforts to ensure the implementation of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights and the UNCRPD and to strengthen rights protection, while respecting their respective competences; urges the Commission to provide the necessary support to Member States to ensure that sufficient resources are allocated to the bodies designated pursuant to Article 33(2) of the UNCRPD so they can fulfil their tasks effectively and efficiently;

108. Calls on the Commission to ensure that EU cultural and creative programmes such as Creative Europe, Erasmus+ and the New European Bauhaus are fully inclusive of artists with disabilities, by introducing accessibility requirements and technical assistance to ensure the participation of artists with disabilities, including those with intellectual and psychosocial disabilities;

109. Emphasises the need to provide psychological and emotional support to families and informal carers, including counselling and peer support programmes, recognising the mental health burden often carried by those who provide long-term care under difficult conditions;

110. Calls on the Commission and the Member States to improve the working conditions in the care and support sector by ensuring fair wages, access to continuous professional training, adequate staffing levels and social protection, including healthcare, sick leave and pension rights; emphasises the need to ensure decent wages and collective bargaining rights for all care workers and to support the transition from informal care roles to formal employment for family caregivers;

111. Calls on the Commission to swiftly present the announced European Care Deal, recognising long-term care as a social responsibility rather than a private one;

Promoting the rights of persons with disabilities globally

112. Insists that the EU should support candidate countries in undertaking concrete measures to align with the EU’s accessibility standards prior to their accession to the EU, with particular attention to services used by women and girls;

113. Underlines that the EU should further mainstream a disability rights dimension in its external action and cooperation policies, including in relation to armed conflicts, humanitarian emergencies and natural disasters, and, in particular, in the gender action plan and the human rights and democracy action plan; calls on the Commission to present an EU disability action plan for external action;

114. Welcomes the inclusion of persons with disabilities in the EU Global Health Strategy; calls on the Commission to ensure that the EU Preparedness Union Strategy fully addresses the needs of persons with disabilities and that emergency responses uphold their dignity, autonomy and safety, including through the distribution of accessible alerts and communications, including advanced mobile location and total conversation for all emergency numbers, mobility accommodations and the training of emergency personnel to respectfully and effectively assist persons with a range of disabilities;

115. Considers it necessary to include persons with disabilities in the design of EU-funded humanitarian aid to ensure that there is an inclusive, accessible and effective approach; demands that all EU-funded humanitarian aid operations apply the humanitarian inclusion standards for persons with disabilities, ensuring inclusive, accessible and non-discriminatory support in crisis situations;

Awareness, governance and measuring progress

116. Recalls that, according to the strategy, EU institutions should make selection, recruitment, employment and retention processes disability-inclusive, and should improve the accessibility of buildings and communication technologies;

117. Asks the Commission to include Parliament at a political level in the Disability Platform and to establish an interinstitutional structured dialogue to follow up on, monitor and evaluate the inclusion of persons with disabilities in Member States in all areas and in all policies, sharing best practice and providing recommendations; asks the Commission, additionally, to regularly report to Parliament on the progress made in disability mainstreaming across all EU policies and programmes, ensuring democratic oversight, accountability, structured political dialogue and participatory governance on disability rights across the EU; recommends that persons with disabilities and their representatives be involved in drafting and monitoring the regulations affecting their rights, given their direct experience and expertise;

120. Calls on the Commission and the Member States to include ‘equal access and non-discrimination for persons with disabilities’ as a dedicated priority theme within the EU Urban Agenda, in order to foster inclusive urban development and facilitate the exchange of best practices between cities, recognising that accessibility, inclusive housing and awareness-raising begin at the level of local governance;

121. Calls on the Member States to develop strategies to combat bullying and harassment directed against children and young persons with disabilities, including in educational contexts and online, and that these strategies recognise disability as a basis for discrimination;

122. Invites the Commission to present evaluation reports on the implementation of regulations and directives related to persons with disabilities, following the end of the transposition period, and to take any necessary actions; calls on the Member States to transpose said directives within the set time limits and with the highest possible level of ambition;

123. Calls on the Commission and the Member States to improve the collection of data on institutionalised populations and deinstitutionalisation efforts, disaggregated by age, gender and setting, and to report this data annually;

124. Calls on the EU institutions to develop programmes under their internal staff policies for traineeship and apprenticeship opportunities for persons with disabilities;

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125. Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the Council and the Commission.