Editorial | Go for broke on Disabilities Act

A news report last week by this newspaper was emblematic of how Jamaica behaves towards its disabled citizens as well as underlined the aggressive leadership role the Government has to take if attitudes that cause people with disabilities to be discriminated against are to be eradicated. Usually, primarily on special occasions, we say the right things about equity and inclusivity, but then little is done.

So last week, Gordon House, the seat of Jamaica’s Parliament, was scrambling to fix its wheelchair lift. The lift was apparently installed some years ago but was never commissioned. It broke for lack of use and maintenance. Its batteries, insofar as the clerk to Parliament, Valrie Curtis, is aware, have gone bad.

“We used to charge it up on occasions and put it out there. It was going out every week and not being used,” said Ms Curtis. “Last year, I told [a Parliament official] to start charging it up and put it back out in the event anybody comes here.”

What was not said, which we infer, is that the effort to service the lift was driven by the imminent promulgation of the Disabilities Act, which came into force on February 14 after its regulations were approved by Parliament last November. People with mobility problems who use wheelchairs, if they attend Gordon House, may now find it easier to enter the building but not to do much more. For as Mark Golding, the opposition leader, observed, Gordon House is not a friendly place to the disabled. Neither, for that matter, are other public buildings.

EVOCATIVE

Two things make Mr Golding’s remarks especially evocative. First, you expect Parliament, insofar as is possible and reasonable, to be the embodiment of the best of us – a place that goes out of its way to accommodate all citizens whether they are able-bodied or physically disabled. Second, at the time the managers at Gordon House were in a mad rush to charge the batteries and get the gears and hydraulics of the wheelchair lift going again, it was seven years since the passage of the Disabilities Act. Seven years!

The law could not be brought into operation during that time because the accompanying regulations were not drafted or approved by Parliament. Over that period, Jamaicans voted twice in general elections; the pro-democracy movement erupted and ebbed in Hong Kong; Russia annexed Crimea, and is in another stand-off with NATO over Ukraine’s wish for membership in the defence group; the fear of a pandemic was centred around Ebola; and it would be a long time before COVID-19 was even a shadow in people’s consciousness. Over that period, too, many global mega projects were started and completed or are near completion. And there was not yet a boom in high-rise, multifamily homes across Kingston and St Andrew. The planning regulations did not allow them to be built.

The law now makes discrimination against people with disabilities not only morally offensive, but one that carries legal peril and sanctions. For instance, disabled persons’ complaints of discrimination or some other breach of rights may go to a tribunal that operates similarly to the one established for industrial relations, the Industrial Disputes Tribunal.

But more specific to the mad rush to get Gordon House’s wheelchair lift operable, the law passed by Parliament in 2014 stipulates that all buildings whose construction began on or after the day in which it came into force must be designed to accommodate people with disabilities. Further, owners of existing public and commercial buildings will also be required to make certain adjustments to their premises to facilitate people with disabilities.

MORAL OBLIGATION

Some of the matters are elaborated on in the regulations to the law. However, governments have a greater moral obligation to act on these kinds of issues than do private citizens. Governments ought not to require laws to act. Indeed, Jamaica’s Government recognised the need and properly asserted its role as the defender of the rights of disabled people. It was seven years ago that Parliament made the first significant move on that front. The Government, therefore, had good time to begin the reconfiguration of public buildings to meet the requirements of the law. Relatively little has been done.

Karl Samuda, the labour and social security minister, who has portfolio responsibility for this subject, promised that the law would be vigorously enforced. We agree. But that enforcement should not only be with respect to private individuals and firms. The Government, too, should be in Minister Samuda’s sights. Further, the regulatory body, the Jamaica Council for Persons with Disabilities, must act without fear.

Moreover, Mr Samuda should insist that there is a set time frame, say five years, within which all government buildings will be retrofitted to bring them in line with the law’s requirement – and better. Indeed, the cost of doing this should be a specific line item in the annual Budget, starting with the one now being reviewed by Parliament. Paying for the repair of Parliament’s wheelchair lift, widening the doors at Gordon House, and reconfiguring bathrooms might need to be reflected in the legislature’s capital expenditure.