Richard Howitt, rapporteur for the opinion of the Committee on Foreign Affairs. – Mr President, firstly this is a human rights convention and it is right that the European Union’s human rights mechanisms are used to support its implementation. So it is now in the Action Plan on democracy and human rights and I welcome that, but I would like to see the Special Representative on Human Rights, human rights dialogues with third countries and country strategy papers on human rights, really champion the Convention and champion the rights of people with disabilities in terms of Europe’s influence worldwide.

Secondly, I say to our friend Ms Thyssen – and I think we will be working even more closely in the next period – do not just do what you would have done anyway in the Disability Strategy. You and your colleagues do some good things and we support you in doing it, but the Convention is a different legal obligation for us in the European Union and we have to show that we are acting differently because of that legal obligation, and not simply redress what we would have done anyway, and pretend it is to do with the Convention. We have to do better than that.

Finally, I was involved in the lobbying for the Convention. I am deeply proud of that and people with disabilities were there, and their organisations, it was fantastic, but when the review came out, the Commission did not undertake a formal consultation with people with disabilities and their organisations – they did informally but not formally. I want to ask you, when it comes to the next review conference, every time you send a delegation to the UN to discuss the Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities, to involve disabled people, involve disabled people’s organisations – nothing about us without us. I know you say those words. When you do it, make sure you do it, and on this occasion, I am sorry but you did not.