The CRPD provides the most contemporary and holistic application of human rights and fundamental freedoms to people with disability. As part of the suite of human rights treaties, it informs the elaboration of human rights more generally. The development of the CRPD was achieved after decades of disability rights activism to bring about a fundamental shift away from the conception that people with disability embody deficits that require systems of care, treatment and protection.

The exclusion of people with disability from the development and implementation of law, policy and practice, in favour of the views of medical experts, service providers and professionals, has been reflected in the development of international law that attempted to confer rights upon people with disability but failed to remove the social welfare and medical response to disability.

With the adoption of the CRPD by the United Nations (UN) in December 2006, the community of nations rejected the ‘view of persons with disabilities as objects of charity, medical treatment and social protection’ and affirmed persons with disability as ‘subjects of rights, able to claim those rights as active members of society’.

The CRPD negotiations are viewed as unprecedented in having involved the highest level of civil society participation of any human rights treaty.6 As outlined in Section 6, through the active involvement of Disabled People’s Organisations (DPOs)7 and other civil society allies, the motto of the disability rights movement – ‘Nothing About Us, Without Us’ – was evident in both the CRPD negotiation process as well as the agreed final text. Australia’s implementation of the CRPD is central to the Terms of Reference of the Royal Commission, which are contained in the Commonwealth Letters Patent signed by the Governor General on 4 April 2019.8 These Terms of Reference state:

“Australia has international obligations to take appropriate legislative, administrative and other measures to promote the human rights of people with disability, including to protect people with disability from all forms of exploitation, violence and abuse under the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.”

People with disability, their DPOs, disability representative organisations and allies, campaigned extensively and over many years at both domestic and international levels for the establishment of the Royal Commission. This campaigning was in response to the lack of comprehensive action and protections to address the significantly high prevalence of all forms of violence, abuse, neglect and exploitation experienced by people with disability. Anti-discrimination legislation, disability action plans, reporting, protective and regulatory bodies, and the justice system at all levels of government, have not been able to adequately prevent, respond to or provide redress for this violence. In addition, there has been little to no recognition that law, policy and practice frameworks allow for forms of violence against people with disability, which legitimises acts of violence as care, treatment and protection. In 2015, these campaign efforts led to the establishment of the Senate Inquiry into violence, abuse and neglect against people with disability in institutional and residential settings, including the gender and age-related dimensions, and the particular situation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples with disability, and culturally and linguistically diverse people with disability (the Senate Inquiry). Recommendation 1 from that Senate Inquiry was to establish a Royal Commission.

However, it was not until 2019, and after further concerted campaigning, that the Royal Commission was finally established by the Australian Government.

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