European Network on Independent Living

The European Network on Independent Living (ENIL) is a non-governmental organisation (NGO) that represents the Independent Living movement in Europe through its members – individuals with disabilities and Centres for Independent Living. ENIL was founded in 1989 during a conference on personal assistance at the European Parliament in Strasbourg. ENIL is a grass roots organisation that strives to influence disability politics at a European level.

Background

The Independent Living movement began in Berkeley, California in 1972 where the first Center for Independent Living was founded by disability rights activists, encouraged by the African-American civil rights movement and the women’s rights movement.

Applying the principles of human rights to people with disabilities, the Independent Living movement claims that people of any age and with any disability

• have a right to live in the community, as opposed to living in an institution;
• have a right to the same range or choices as everybody else in housing, transportation, education and employment;
• have a right to participate in the social, economic and political life of their communities;
• have a right to have a family and to live as responsible and respected members of their communities with all the duties and privileges that this entails, and to unfold their potential.

Armed with the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, the Independent Living movement tries to change the subject of disability away from a welfare topic and into human rights topic; away from the medical model and into a social model. The medical model defines someone with a disability as a "patient"; the social model puts them firmly in the driver’s seat as a "consumer".

Embracing the social model for disability, ENIL recognises that the real experts when it comes to designing, developing and managing disability services are those with experience of the issues – people with disabilities themselves.

Campaigns

Free our People

Article 19 of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities provides that all disabled people have the right to live and participate in the community. ENIL is campaigning for comprehensive, quality community-based services to be available and accessible to all people with disabilities, including people with complex dependency needs.

Stop the Difference

Article 19 of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with a Disabilities says that all must have personal assistance. ENIL is campaigning for personal assistance to become a legal right that is not means tested. ENIL urges governments and the European Parliament to make article 19 of the UN convention a reality and to consult with organizations that are run and controlled by people with disabilities who have experience of independent living. Only a minority of people with a disability have personal assistance.

Strasbourg Freedom Drives

ENIL Freedom Drives take place every second year in Strasbourg with ENIL members and supporters marching to the European Parliament to present their signature campaigns and demands to MEPs. The European Parliament Disability Intergroup has undertaken to support ENIL Freedom Drives as a long-standing and popular tradition at the EP.