Mission

OUR COMMITMENT

European Centre for the Rights of Children with Disabilities (ECRCD) is committed to develop a unitary framework and to provide coherence to the civil society’s response towards the need to promote, protect and enhance the rights of disabled children, so that they could benefit of a real and effective social inclusion into the Romanian society. 

In the past decade and mainly after Romania’s accession to the European Union (2007), the efforts of the relevant actors resulted in a number of evolutions in relation to establishing a legal and institutional framework in the field of assistance and protection of disabled children. Despite these progresses, the social reality shows that there are still many reasons of concern when it comes to the capacity and availability of the relevant public authorities to ensure both the adapted protection to the specific needs of this social group and the possibility to enjoy full and effective access to the rights and guarantees as established by the national and international legislation in the field.

As a response to the shortcomings of the public system in terms of assistance and protection of the children with disability, there have been a series of reactions of the civil society, consisting mainly of isolated measures dedicated to a limited number of children with disability. Therefore, the response of the Romanian civil society has not been until now fully articulated so as to propose alternative and complementary solutions to the acute needs of this social group and it has not been able to become a sound partner of dialog in relation to the national and European actors involved in law and policy making in this specific area.

In this context, the European Centre for the Rights of Children with Disabilities comes to answer the real and acute needs of the disabled children, being committed to support the activities of the public authorities and to coagulate the efforts of the civil society meant to improve and develop the assistance and protection system for this social group, mainly by meeting these objectives:

•  Lobby, support and representation activities at the national, European and international fora aiming at the adoption of legal instruments ensuring and improving the assistance and protection of children with disabilities;
• Drafting of legal acts and attending public debates on topics related to the assistance and protection of children with disabilities;
• Drafting and promoting proposals of public policies in the relevant field;
• Drafting analysis and monitoring reports in relation to:
• the implementation of relevant national and international legislation;
• practice of the public bodies with competencies in the field;
• de lege ferenda needs and other complementary measures identified for the purpose of strengthening and/or ensuring an effective access to their rights for the children with disabilities.
• Information and awareness campaigns regarding the rights of children with disabilities and their need for social inclusion;
• Carrying out training and awareness activities for and in close cooperation with the relevant public bodies and the civil society;
• Providing consultancy in the field of European and international legislation;
• Providing counseling and support for the family members and carers of children with disabilities;
• Implementing national, regional or international thematic special assistance  projects for the benefit of children with disabilities;
• Implementing projects aimed at further developing the institutional capacity to provide necessary assistance for children with disabilities based on minimum quality standards;
• Initiating and implementing an identification and referral mechanism for children with disabilities cases;
• Carrying out activities of information on causes leading to disability.