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UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities

My Lords, I draw to the noble Lord’s attention the fact that the European Commission has moved on in its position and now recognises that the time has come to move beyond employment towards a general directive, covering not only disability but other strands of discrimination that are not currently covered—age, religion and so on. Indeed, the Commission will launch a consultation this summer on how it might be possible to move forward in that direction within the next year or so. I hope that when the consultation is launched the Government might be willing to take a slightly more positive attitude towards it than the Minister evinced in his wind-up.