Statement by Lord Hannay of Chiswick, Chair of UNA-UK

At the Equality & Human Rights Commission parliamentary seminar to mark the ratification of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities

9 June 2009

I am delighted to be here in my capacity as Chair of UNA-UK to celebrate the important and auspicious occasion of the ratification by the UK of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. UNA-UK championed this treaty and lobbied for early ratification.

The UK was one of the first countries to sign the convention, and it is good to see that the UK is now ratifying it reasonably promptly. All too often, countries - the UK included - do not follow-up signature of such treaties with ratification. An urgent example of this is the Convention on Cluster Munitions, agreed in Dublin in May 2008.

The disability convention and other UN human rights treaties such as the Convention on the Rights of the Child are fine examples of the UN’s indispensability. These treaties do not just help to protect human rights in one or two countries, they establish international standards and norms. Of course we need to apply these provisions in the UK but many countries need them even more, and are further away from meeting these standards than we are. By signing and ratifying the convention the UK is helping by setting an example.

For that same reason we must sound one discordant note. There are - not for the first time - too many UK reservations on specific provisions of this convention. Some of these are in my view excessively pernickety e.g. the reservations on immigration and schooling. My hope is that the government will review the reservations regularly and withdraw them as soon as possible, as we have done on other occasions, with other conventions.

This convention marks another step along the long road to a rules-based system of international cooperation. We may sometimes feel that the world is a pretty disordered place, but countries like the UK can demonstrate that it is gradually becoming less so.

Click here to read more about UNA-UK advocacy of the Convention