This document includes the general comments adopted by the United Nations Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities on Article 19 of the Convention of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD): the right to live independently and being included in the community.
Within General Comment No. 5, the Committee explicitly states that children have the right to grow up in a family and that institutions, regardless of size or quality, are not adequate substitutes for growing up with a family.
In defining independent living arrangements, the Committee states:
"Policies of de-institutionalization therefore require implementation of structural reforms, which go beyond the closure of institutional settings. Large or small group homes are especially dangerous for children, for whom there is no substitute for the need to grow up with a family. “Family-like” institutions are still institutions and are no substitute for care by a family." (para. 16(c))
Regarding the accessibility of community services and facilities (Article 19(c)), the Committee states:
"For children, the core of the right to live independently and be included in the community entails a right to grow up in a family." (para. 37)
The Committee identifies State obligations to address institutionalization (para. 41, 42); State obligations to respect persons with disabilites by renovating institutions and not building new ones (para. 49); State obligations to protect "children from being abandoned or instiutionalized on the grounds of disability" (para. 52); and obligations to fulfill the measures of the Convention, which includes providing "adequate support services to family carers, so they can in turn support their child or relative to live independently in the community." (para. 68)
