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Tony O’Reilly, Human Rights Advocate, Northwest Forum of People with Disabilities (NWFPD)
Tony has been a human rights activist in the ‘disabled persons’ movement for over 30 years. He is currently a member of the Northwest Forum of People with Disabilities (NWFPWD’s) Management Committee. Representing the NWFPWD’s he was part of Disability Action’s Northern Ireland wide delegation to the UN Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities in Geneva during the periodic examination of UK’s progress on the implementation of the Convention in 2017.
He successfully negotiated with the UNCRPD Committee to publish General comment No. 7 (2018) on the clarification of the participation of persons with disabilities in decision making processes with regard to the application and interpretation of Art 4:3 and Art 33.3 of the UNCRPD - in the implementation and monitoring of the Convention and contributed to its content.
▪ Prioritising the importance of disabled persons lead organisations (DPO’s) direct involvement in the decision-making process associated with the monitoring and implementation of the Convention;
▪ States parties obligations to fund and support DPO’s;
Tony through Ministerial appointment was a member of the Disability Expert Advisory Panel alongside Professor Eilionóir Flynn, Dr Bronagh Byrne and the late Sean Fitzimmons tasked with developing themes and recommendations for a new Disability Strategy as part of the Northern Ireland Programme for Government. The Panel’s Report - key themes and recommendations was published by the Department for Communities (DfC) in March 2021.
More recently Tony was as an independent consultant for assisted Disability Action in the research and drafting of its report Progress towards the Implementation of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (February 2022), and for the Equality and Human Rights Commission in their role as the Independent Mechanism for Northern Ireland with responsibility for promoting and monitoring the implementation of Convention in Northern Ireland for the future review and examination by the UN Committee.
