KNPD welcomes ‘centralisation of services’ at disability hub

The National Commission for Disabled People (KNPD) has welcomed the setting up of disability hub, insisting that it will “centralise services for disabled people that are currently scattered”.

"Through the hub, disabled people will be provided with services in the heart of a community, right next to commercial establishments and other facilities,” KNPD chairman Oliver Scicluna said in a statement.

The €12 million hub, to be financed by the European Union, was announced in the Budget for 2016 and will be located at San Pawl tat-Targa.

Parliamentary secretary for the disabled Justyne Caruana has said that the complex will include purpose-built residential units with shared beds, a day centre, a multi-purpose hall, a purpose-built therapeutic facility, and sports facilities.

It is also set to include restaurants, shops and hostels to be managed by persons with disability.

However, former KNPD chairperson Joe Camilleri has sharply criticised the hub as a means of “segregation by stealth”.

“The hub should be cause for very grave concern for all disabled people, their families and the genuine allies of the disability movement in the Maltese islands,” Camilleri wrote in an opinion piece in the Times of Malta.

Camilleri wrote that the same proposal had been made shortly after the 2013 general election: “Luckily, for various reasons, the scheme was a non-starter. However, it seems that the individual behind it is still trying to ‘rebrand’ it as something new and has managed to have it included in the 2016 Budget.”

However, Caruana insisted that the hub was the brainchild of a committee of experts that had included Camilleri himself, that had been tasked with proposing means of improving the quality of life of disabled people and promoting their social inclusion.