Conclusions and recomendation from the conference on independent living of people with disabilities

Participants of the Start up Conference „Independent living of persons with disabilities’’ held on 24^th and 25^th of May 2012 in Hotel „Princess“ in Bar has adopted following Conclusions and recommendations:

First, we, participants of the Conference want to emphasize and to welcome all positive steps in improvement of status of persons with disabilities in our society.

As positive aspects of the Conference we want to highlight: willingness between persons with disabilities (youth) for development of the network for independent living and commitment of participants of the conference to collaborate on the promotion of philosophy and principles of independent living of persons with disabilities in the future period.

Besides that, as general advancement in society we notice empowerment of persons with disabilities for Independent living, primarily with service of personal assistance and with greater level of independence from other members of the family and society.

The personal assistance must be considered as a human right, which is why it cannot be determined by financial status and capabilities of individuals, communities, society and the State as a whole. In some countries in the region, independent living and personal assistance are not a matter and ‘care’ of the State, but it is a responsibility of the municipalities / local authorities, therefore  provision of services of PA depend on the local authorities and with that this create disparities between individual regions.

Since philosophy of the independent living depends of various preconditions and itself  is not sufficient condition for fully realization of independence and freedom, and for enjoyment of basic human rights, and the fact that every country of the region characterize that personal assistance is not human rights of persons with disabilities and that in countries whit Law on personal assistance, service is not provided by the Government but is regulated only at local level, therefore we consider that in future period is necessary to do the following:

• To define by Law and to ensure in  practice social housing and housing with support;
• To increase awareness level between persons with disabilities about importance of independent living and about the possibilities for implementation of independent living;
• To increase awareness level in social environment of persons with disabilities  about possibilities kod okruženja OSI possibilities for  independent living and about the need and usefulness of independent living of PWD’s;
• To distinguished personal assistance from other means of assistance (assistant in house, assistant in work, assistant in teaching);
• To improve treatment toward persons with intelectual disabilties and toward persons with mental disabilities;
• To enable representation of PWD’s in desicion making processes.;
• To provide sufficient financial support for organisations of PWD’s, so that they could be able to provide personal assiatance services.;
• To work on networking of DPO’s in order to reach common goals and acting in area of independent living;
• To establish State fond for independent living;
• To establish centre/centres for independent living and to develop network;
• To provide and enable services which will ensure independent living of persons with disabilities;
• To improve situation at local level, primarily by implementing Local Action Plans in field of disability.