As previously reported in the Bulletin, Ireland is due to be examined under the International Covenant on Economics, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) in May 2015. The examination will be carried out by the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.
The Committee will examine the Government’s progress on protecting and respecting people’s rights in areas such as education, health, housing, social security, employment, protection of families and cultural life. FLAC will be submitting a "shadow" report to the Committee on these issues. The Shadow Report aims to help influence the list of issues which the UN Committee will consider and the questions that they will raise with the Government in advance of the hearing next May. In preparing the Shadow Report, FLAC held consultations to gather information from people and non-governmental organisations working in these areas. Consultations were held in Galway, Cork and Dublin. In addition to these, two thematic consultations were held in Dublin on the right to housing and the right to social security.
A wide variety of groups were represented at these consultations, highlighting a diverse range of concerns about the experience of people in accessing their economic, social and cultural rights. These included concerns about conditions of employment, the negative impact of the reduction in jobseeker payments on young people, changes to eligibility criteria for social welfare payments, as well as cuts to income supports in general. In relation to the right to participate in a cultural life, access for people in rural areas was an issue, for both elderly and young people alike. In addition, local authority housing, homelessness, review of medical cards, Direct Provision, food poverty and zero hour contracts were among the wide-ranging issues that were also raised. Feedback from the consultations was positive and there was a high level of engagement. Maeve Regan of Mercy Law Resource Centre (MLRC) said: ‘Thanks for the brilliant consultation on Wednesday. It was a really interesting, practical and lively discussion’. The information and discussions from the consultations will be fed into the Shadow Report. Materials from the sessions are available on www.flac.ie.
The deadline for submissions to the Shadow Report was 30 May 2014, but if you feel that you have further information to contribute then please do contact the research team who are currently working on a draft. There will be a final consultation in Dublin in July once the draft report is produced and details will be confirmed in future PILA bulletins.
For further details, see www.flac.ie or contact the research team at icescr@flac.ie.