I have been made aware of the plight of a girl from Calabria who is severely disabled and who depends on her family for assistance on a day-to-day basis. She doesn’t have a bathroom which is suitable for her needs, she lives on the top floor of a local authority-run apartment block which has no lift and has never received regional benefit for the disabled.

Following the issuing of a public notice concerning regional funds designed to improve disabled access to housing (ERDF ROP 2007/2013 for the Region of Calabria) her father submitted an application for so-called ‘accessible housing’. Unfortunately, this application was rejected without justification. For the purposes of legal action, the girl’s father submitted a request for access to the documents. The managing authority agreed to allow the documents to be consulted but would not allow a copy of them to be issued on account of opposition from third parties representing other parties on the housing list. This is contrary to Italian case-law in this regard, according to which the right to defend oneself in court takes precedence over the right of confidentiality. I would add that this particular case has still not been resolved after almost a year, the first request for access dating back to March 2013.