Regional Legal Instruments That Support Inclusive Education

Arnardóttir O (2011) The right to inclusive education for children with disabilities – Innovations in the CRPD. In: Eide A, Möller J, Ziemele I (eds.) Making peoples heard. Essays on Human Rights in Honour of Gudmundur Alfredsson. Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, Leiden/Boston, pp. 219-221 In England, the education system for SEN and disabled children and young people was reformed under the Education Act 1996 after the Children and Family Act came into force in September 2014. The Dakar Framework for Action is the frame of reference for the Education for All initiative, the primary commitment of the United Nations to provide quality basic education to all children, youth and adults. At the meeting of the World Education Forum held in Dakar, Senegal, in April 2000, the vision set out in the Salamanca Declaration was reaffirmed. The Dakar Framework for Action is committed to the goal of education for all and commits Governments to achieving quality basic education for all by 2015 or earlier, with a particular focus on girls` education, and includes a commitment by donor countries and institutions that “no country seriously committed to basic education will be hindered in achieving this goal due to lack of resources”. This framework requires UNESCO to coordinate partnerships between UNDP, UNFPA, UNICEF and the World Bank to achieve the goals of Education for All. unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000121147 The challenge of inclusive education is to realize the right to education by providing persons with disabilities with access to a quality and meaningful place in the education system. This can be achieved by adapting education to the needs of people with disabilities. Excluding autistic people from the inclusive education process would reinforce stereotypes and negative attitudes towards them.

United Nations General Assembly Resolution 67/82 of 19 March 2013 highlighted the importance of improving inclusive education programmes for infants, children and adults with autism as part of an integrated approach to addressing ASD. In addition, in his message for World Autism Awareness Day on 2 April 2014, the United Nations Secretary-General highlighted the key value of education for people with autism, as “schools connect children to their communities. By involving children with different learning abilities in mainstream and technical schools, we can change attitudes and promote respect. Reindal SM (2008) A social relational model of disability: a theoretical framework for special education? Eur J Spec Needs Educ 23(2):135–146 King M (2006) How law define the special educational needs of autistic children. Child Fam Law Q 18(1):23–42 Another positive aspect is the introduction of a forward-looking obligation in Article 4(1)(a) to ensure “effective and non-discriminatory access to social protection, social advantages, health care, education and access to and supply of publicly available goods and services, including housing and transport”. The Directive does not specify who has this obligation, but it implies that Member States and service providers have a positive obligation to take measures to ensure equal access for people with disabilities. In this context, it must be said that an inclusive education system is no more expensive than a segregated education system. According to UNICEF, “countries are increasingly recognizing the inefficiency of multiple administrative systems, organizational structures and services, and that it is the option of special schools that is financially unrealistic.” Footnote 29 Inclusive education may generate additional costs in the short term and become profitable only in the long term. Although it is difficult to determine the significant nature of housing for inclusive education, several sources indicate that its costs are often overestimated and are mostly available. The Handbook for Parliamentarians is based on the experience that up to 80-90% of children with special educational needs, including children with developmental disabilities, can be easily integrated into mainstream schools and classrooms as long as there is basic support for their inclusion.

Footnote 38 Meanwhile, the Committee on the Rights of the Child adopted general comment No. 9 on the rights of children with disabilities, which also states that inclusive education should be the goal of educating children with disabilities. However, it also acknowledged that “the degree of inclusion may vary” and that “a continuum of services and program options must be maintained in circumstances where fully inclusive education is not possible in the immediate future.” Footnote 27 According to LOGSE, Spain has intensified its efforts to promote inclusive education and introduced new provisions for students with special needs. It is not excluded that adequate accommodation or support may not be desirable for a limited number of children with severe and multiple disabilities. Therefore, regular education may not be feasible for these children. Article 24 does not prevent States from establishing special schools for such children. However, this also does not oblige them to receive special schools, as was confirmed during the negotiations. Footnote 31 In other words, while such schools may be established for some children with disabilities, they do not need to be had. States therefore have some room for manoeuvre, although they should provide a strong justification based on the CRPD when maintaining a (partially) segregated education system. In order to improve the quality of inclusive education in Italy, a draft law was submitted to the Italian Parliament in 2014. This bill ensures the continuity of support teachers by establishing specific figures for didactic support at each level of education, and proposes to replace the functional diagnosis and the dynamic-functional profile with the functional profile to be developed not only by medical specialists, but also by families and teachers.

In addition, the bill introduces a specific duty to provide reasonable accommodation to fully comply with Article 24 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. The concept of inclusion implies that everyone is equal and should be in the same position as others at the beginning, even if achieving this goal requires individualized measures. The CRPD gives the right to inclusive education a legally binding status and has sparked an important global debate on the inclusion of children with disabilities in education. Supports complement and differ from reasonable accommodations. Support measures are subject to the obligation to progressively realize the right to inclusive education within the limits of the maximum resources available (as opposed to the obligation to provide reasonable accommodation). Support measures are general measures that should gradually lead to inclusive education. Therefore, these measures do not need to be adopted all at once, provided that available resources are used to achieve inclusive education and that States take immediate action in this regard. Council Resolution on equal opportunities for pupils and students with disabilities in education and training, 5.5.2003.

Education is not only vital in itself, but also for participation in all areas of social activities. People with autism often have and still suffer from a widespread denial of the right to education in some parts of the world because of their special needs.