Francisco Javier Delgado Exposito, a resident of La Orotava, suffers from muscle atrophy since he was a baby and at 46 years of age he has undertaken a fight for regulation in Canary Islands of right to personal assistance at home as an alternative to internment in residences. After sending innumerable emails to different authorities and entities, the launch of a campaign to collect signatures through the Change.org platform has allowed it to add the support of almost a thousand people until yesterday. Last Friday he received a visit from a new ally in this lawsuit for the benefit of the large dependents of the islands, the Common Deputy, Rafael Yanes, who considers it “fair” to support Francisco’s request that “the Canary Islands Autonomous Community regulate personal assistance and can live at home as an alternative to a residence.”
After learning the story of Francisco Javier Delgado through THE DAY, Rafael Yanes traveled to his house in La Orotava to listen, face to face, the demands of this Tenerife native who is currentlyhe can only move his neck and some fingers of the hands, with which it handles the mouse that connects it with the world.
Delgado delivered a complaint to Yanes in which he requests “that in the Autonomous Community of the Canary Islands, the Parliament of the Canary Islands, the Government of the Canary Islands and the rest of the institutions involved guarantee compliance with the law of the large dependents and people with functional diversity to receive personal assistance adapted to their needs to guarantee their freedom of choice of residence, their independence, equal opportunities and respect for their ability to maintain control of their life.
In that complaint, Francisco Delgado recalls that “the right to personal assistance is already cited in article 19 of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, of 2006, which recognizes its right to live independently and to be included in the community. The signatory states, including Spain, pledged that people with disabilities should have “the opportunity to choose their place of residence, where and with whom to live, under equal conditions, and with access to home care services, residential and support, including the personal assistance necessary to facilitate their existence and their inclusion in the community, and avoid their isolation or separation.
The right to personal assistance is also mentioned in Law 51/2003 for Equal Opportunities, Non-Discrimination and Universal Accessibility, and in Law 39/2006 on the Promotion of Personal Autonomy and Attention to People in a Situation of Dependence. However, neither these laws nor their subsequent regulatory developments regulate it labor or legal.
Delgado explains that “people in a situation of great dependency and without great economic or family resources are forced in the Canary Islands to request entry into a residence due to the non-existence of an alternative that allows them to continue with their lives in their homes and next to their loved ones. This compulsory institutionalization for economic reasons threatens the fundamental rights and freedoms of people who should not be discriminated against for reasons of health or personal autonomy. The home help that is offered from the town halls does not guarantee this right either, since it is limited to basic issues and very little time a day.
«Public administrations dedicate large amounts of money to maintain residences, Budgets of which a part could be allocated to start implementing personal assistance in the Canary Islands for those who request it. It would be enough to allocate the money that your residential place would cost each month to finance the hiring of the number of hours of personal assistance necessary, ”Delgado details.
“It must be regulated in the Canary Islands”
The Deputy of the Common, Rafael Yanes, explained after meeting with Francisco Delgado that “as soon as the new general director of the Dependency of the Government of the Canary Islands takes office, I will request an appointment with her and I am going to suggest that the figure of the personal assistant should be regulated in Canary Islands so that people who so wish, and under the conditions determined by the public administration, have the possibility of choosing where to live. There are people who prefer to go to a center, but those who prefer to stay at home must be given that option. Rafael Yanes recognizes that the Dependency Service in the Canary Islands has many deficiencies that must be corrected, “and the worst data in Spain”, for which he also considers it very necessary “to provide it with more financial, personal and technical means.”
