In March 2015 ATD launched the project “Let’s put Human Rights in our Manifestos”. From March 2015 to June 2015, ATD volunteers and community groups from the North Inner City will look at what Economic, Social and Cultural Rights mean today and will discuss the request of Irish Constitutional Convention to strengthen the protection of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in the Irish Constitution.
The Housing crisis, the Right 2 Water demonstrations, the Constitutional Convention recommendation from 23rd February 2014 to include Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in the Irish Constitution are converging issues. They tell us it is the right time to have genuine conversations at community level on Human Rights.
In 2015, pre-election year, the project “Let’s put Human Rights on our Manifestos” is part of the mobilisation of the Irish Economic, Social and Cultural Rights Initiative*. This coalition of NGOs calls on the Government to accept the recommendation of the Constitutional Convention and to prepare a referendum allowing the citizens to decide whether in the future, the Irish State should be obliged to make decisions that prioritise the fundamental dignity of people.
Between March and June 2015, ATD will organise workshops with 5 or 6 local groups (at least twice an hour and half sessions for each group). Workshops will be organised in peer support groups, early school leavers training centres and adult education projects.
The project will be concluded with a plenary meeting gathering all participants and with the design of an advocacy booklet which will invite political parties to include the ESC Rights Recommendation of the Constitutional Convention in their pre-election 2016 Manifestos.
To volunteer for this project, contact: volunteering@atdireland.ie
*****
The United Nation Guiding Principles on Extreme Poverty and Human Rights adopted in 2012 will be a reference document for the workshops.
The GPs are the first internationally agreed text to stress that not only poverty, but also extreme poverty exists in every country in the world, and it is both a cause and a consequence of multiple human rights violations. The guidelines firmly anchor the struggle to end poverty in the framework of respect for human rights. Following their adoption in 2012, the task is now to disseminate and promote them, from grassroots to Government level, and to have them put into action.
The ATD project “Let’s put Human Rights in our Manifestos” is supported by IMPACT‘s Joe Lucey Small Grants Fund.
*The Economic, Social and Cultural (ESC) Rights Initiative is a network of organisations and individuals with a shared belief that strengthening the protection of ESC rights would play a fundamental role in the creation of a more just, inclusive and socially sustainable society. The aim of the Initiative is to ensure that ESC rights are made legally enforceable in the Constitution. Members of the Initiative are among others: Age Action, Aiden Lloyd, Amnesty International Ireland, All Together in Dignity Ireland, Children Rights Alliance, Community Action Network, Equality and Rights Alliance, Free Legal Aid Centres (FLAC), Focus Ireland, Irish Heart Foundation, Mercy Law Centre, Community Law and Mediation, Pavee Point, Peter McVerry Trust.
