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Article 23 - Social security and an adequate standard of living
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References
Standard Rules
on the Equalization of Opportunities for Persons with Disabilities
Adopted by the United Nations General Assembly, forty-eighth session, resolution
48/96, annex, of 20 December 1993
Rule 8 - Income maintenance and social security
States are responsible for the provision of social security and income maintenance
for persons with disabilities.
• States should ensure the provision of adequate income support to persons with
disabilities who, owing to disability or disability-related factors, have temporarily
lost or received a reduction in their income or have been denied employment
opportunities. States should ensure that the provision of support takes into
account the costs frequently incurred by persons with disabilities and their
families as a result of the disability.
• In countries where social security, social insurance or other social welfare
schemes exist or are being developed for the general population, States should
ensure that such systems do not exclude or discriminate against persons with
disabilities.
• States should also ensure the provision of income support and social security
protection to individuals who undertake the care of a person with a disability.
• Social security systems should include incentives to restore the income-earning
capacity of persons with disabilities. Such systems should provide or contribute
to the organization, development and financing of vocational training. They
should also assist with placement services.
• Social security programmes should also provide incentives for persons with
disabilities to seek employment in order to establish or re-establish their
income-earning capacity.
• Income support should be maintained as long as the disabling conditions remain
in a manner that does not discourage persons with disabilities from seeking
employment. It should only be reduced or terminated when persons with disabilities
achieve adequate and secure income.
• States, in countries where social security is to a large extent provided by
the private sector, should encourage local communities, welfare organizations
and families to develop self-help measures and incentives for employment or
employment-related activities for persons with disabilities.
World Programme of Action Concerning Disabled Persons
Adopted by the United Nations General Assembly, thirty-seventh session, Resolution
37/52 of 3 December 1982
Income maintenance and social security
Every Member State should work towards the inclusion, within its systems of
laws and regulations, of provisions covering the general and supporting objectives
of the World Programme of Action referring to social security.
Member States should ensure that disabled persons have equal opportunities to
obtain all forms of income, maintenance thereof, and social security. Such a
process should take place in forms adjusted to the economic system and degree
of development of the Member State.
Where social security, social insurance and other such systems exist for the
general population, they should be reviewed to make certain that adequate benefits
and services for prevention, rehabilitation and the equalization of opportunities
are provided for disabled persons and their families and that regulations under
these systems, whether applicable to services providers or the services recipients,
should not exclude or discriminate against such persons. The establishment and
the development of a public system of social care and of industrial safety and
health protection constitute essential prerequisites for achieving the aims
set.
Easily accessible arrangements should be made by which disabled persons and
their families can appeal, through impartial hearing, against decisions concerning
their rights and benefits in this field.