The Swedish Agency for Participation National monitoring using the recommendation of the UN Human Rights Office 7 October 2015 Arvid Lindén Head of department

The Swedish Agency for Participation

National monitoring using the recommendation of the UN

Human Rights Office

7 October 2015Arvid Lindén

Head of department of knowledge and guidelines



National implementation and monitoring of the Convention

• The Ministry of Health and Social Affairs is the focal point

• There is also a high level inter-ministerial working group with representatives from most of the ministries.

• The Minister responsible for the disability policy regularly convenes a delegation, comprising representatives of Disabled Persons Organisations (DPO) and Secretaries of State for consultation and exchange of information.


Swedish disability policy

• The national goals for Swedish disability policy

• The UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD)

• A strategy for implementation of Swedish disability policy 2011-2016


A strategy for implementation of Swedish disability policy 2011-2016

• Follow up and evaluation

• Municipalities and county councils important actors

• Output for the individual in the everyday life

• Emphasis on a gender and children based approach

• Strategic agencies

• 12 policy areas in focus


12 focus areas

• Labor market policy• Education policy• Social policy• Health policy• Increased physical accessibility• Public transport policy• IT-policy• Culture• The media • Sports• The judiciary• Consumer policy


Why do we monitor?

• Make gaps and inequalities visible

• Target the most efficient improvements

• Monitor development over time

• Could inherently strengthen a human rights-based approach


Living conditions of PWD

Webb Panel, voice of PWD

Municipalities work

Governmental agencies work

Qualititative studies

Strategic agencies’ reports

Other studies

Monitoring Swedish disability policy


Examples of the monitoring system

• Living conditions of PWD– Data on PWD compared to the rest of the

population– Usually applied as an heterogenous group

of PWD– Health, employment, education level data as

well as participation in culture, sports etc.– All areas and ages not fully covered in the

data



• Panel of PWD– Over 1800 individuals with disability– Regular surveys on perceived participation

and obstacles to participation



• Monitoring municipalities and county councils– Annual surveys of five policy areas to all 290

municipalities in Sweden and one survey regarding public transport to 21 county councils

– Efforts of improving conditions to participation

– Open comparisons – follow up as a method of improvement



• Open comparison of governmental agencies– Annual survey of 271 agencies with at least

10 employees– Accessibility of buildings, communication

and information



• Reports from strategic agencies responsible for the implementation of disability policy in their sector – Annual reports from 22 agencies


United Nations office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNOHCHR) model for monitoring

of human rights at the national level.


Level of indicators – main indicators

• Structural level– Organisation/governance– Steering mechanisms

• Proces level– Promoting activities– Accessible physical envi.– Influence

• Outcome level– Results


What happens with the results?

• Feedback to muncipalities and authorities

• Presentation of results• Reporting to UN on CRPD• Basis for government

decisions• Development processes• Useful for municipalities

and DPO:s etc.


• Among persons with disabilities, 26 % feels like they have been discriminated against in their workplace.

• 8 of 10 municipalities use digital forms for job applications. But only 1 out of 10 have ensured the accessibility of the application form.

An example from the labor policy area


Another example from the education area

• Large problems with giving students the support they need. 47 % of the examined schools are not able to give the support the students are entitled to.

• Only 1 of 4 municipalities has goals to increase the accessibility and the participation to education for pupils with disabilities.

• The situation is better in higher education. Students with disabilities study full time to the same extent as other students.


Can you get to work or school?

• Something very positive – all 21 regional agencies responsible for public transport had put demands on accessibility in precurements when buying new buses

• 90 % of the public transport vehicles have a place reserved for wheelchairs. That is an increase of 22 % in one year


There is still lots of things left to do….

…..until all people with disabilities can participate on equal terms in Sweden


Challenges

• Different interests (politics, statistical etc.)

• Make priorities (the right ones)

• Not get stuck on details - get the overall picture

• Childrens, equality and intersectional perspectives

• Methods to monitor accessibility – big data?

• Comparable indicators across countries


Current work to get comparable data cross area and cross nations

• 12 areas of indicators

• Analyzing statistics from the areas, trying to get some main indicators

• Looking also at other countries statistics and indicators

• Find the least common denominator

• “simplify” - Discriminate between dimensions to be able to distinguish subgroups



Indicators

• Level of education – high / low

• Employment – yes / no

• Income – high / low


7 October [email protected]

[email protected]@mfd.se


mailto:[email protected]



Documents

The Swedish Agency for Participation National monitoring using the recommendation of the UN Human Rights Office 7 October 2015 Arvid Lindén Head of department