Our Minister of Family and Social Services, Derya Yanık, said, “The Barrier-Free Life Fair makes very important contributions in minimizing obstacles in accessing rehabilitation and professional care, integrating into all areas of social life, and maximizing the living standards of persons with disabilities.”

Under the auspices of the Presidency of the Republic of Türkiye and hosted by the Ministry of Family and Social Services, the introductory meeting of the "12th Barrier-Free Life Fair and Awareness Summit" was held in Istanbul on 1-4 December with the participation of Minister Derya Yanık.

In her speech at the meeting chaired by the Darülaceze Presidency, Minister Yanık said that they have come a long way in creating services in accordance with the principle of social state, and that their social work activities under the responsibility of their Ministries compete with the most developed countries of the world, and even go ahead in many topics.

Underlining that it is possible to see the result only when Türkiye's services produced during the epidemic are compared to the "very developed" Continental Europe today, Yanık said, "When we say this, there are people who persistently and stubbornly reflect on it as if it's over, and draw politics over it. I want to tell them in advance: We develop a supra-political point of view at the point of service to human beings and our studies on human disadvantage. We provide services to our people based on rights with a supra-political perspective, regardless of who needs them or who they are. We will continue to do that.”

Minister Yanık stated that as the Ministry, they plan and carry out services in different regions of the country according to the population, the number of persons with disabilities, the ratio of older persons and the children, based on scientific foundations, good research, without wasting public resources.

"Our country is an example to the world with its policies in the field of social services and assistance"

Pointing out that the Barrier-Free Life Fair, which they are honoured to host under the auspices of the Presidency, is the first and only fair in its field in Türkiye and the 6th in the world, Yanık said: “The Barrier-Free Life Fair makes very important contributions in minimizing the barriers to accessing rehabilitation and professional care, integrating into all areas of social life, and maximizing the living standards of persons with disabilities."

Minister Derya Yanık explained that approximately 15 percent of the world's population consists of persons with disabilities and that the ratio of persons with disabilities to the population in Türkiye is around 7 percent, and said:

“According to the World Health Organization (WHO), 80 percent of approximately 1 billion persons with disabilities live in developing countries. 46 percent of the population of persons with disabilities consists of people aged 65 and over. According to the United Nations data, the probability of persons with disabilities being exposed to violence increases between 4 and 10 times. With the visionary policies, we have developed in the field of social work and social assistance under the leadership of our President in the last 20 years, our country has become one of the exemplary countries in this regard. Our government and our Ministry have literally made social revolutions in every field such as education, health, economy, and social life in order to ensure the full, effective and natural participation of persons with disabilities in social life. With a rights-based and equal-opportunity perspective, we accelerated our efforts to solve problems by addressing the problems. The point we have reached is far ahead of the point where we set off. So is it enough for us? Of course not. We still have a long way to go, a lot of work to do. As soon as all our citizens reach the same level of social welfare and reach the place where they want to see him, we will consider ourselves to have completed our task. I hope we will continue to work for this, as we have been working tirelessly for 20 years."

"Let's fulfill the requirements of accessibility standards"

Pointing out that the AK Party, after becoming the government in 2002, was the political will to enact Türkiye's first Turkish Disability Act in 2005, Yanık said that Türkiye was one of the first countries to sign the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities under the leadership of President Erdoğan in 2007.

Recalling that they announced the 2030 Barrier-Free Vision Document, which is their roadmap for building a society where persons with disabilities can realize their potential as equal citizens, Minister Yanık said that President Erdoğan's declaring 2020 as the "Year of Accessibility" gave them a significant impetus in reaching their goals.

Talking about the Accessibility Evaluation Module (ERDEM) projects, Yanık said that they carry out the monitoring and inspection in a way that includes the applications of the citizens, and that they give accessibility certificates to the buildings, open spaces and public transportation vehicles that are deemed appropriate as a result of the inspections.

Derya Yanık, Minister of Family and Social Services, stated that as of August 2022, they had given accessibility certificates to a total of 2,817 buildings and said:

“As the Ministry, we attach great importance to the attainment of accessibility standards. We continue to do our best at the point of monitoring and control. Seeing this meeting as an opportunity, I would like to remind the architects, the creators of the project, our civil engineers, contractors and those who implement them, especially at this point: Please pay attention to accessibility standards. Please, fulfill the requirements of these standards, because if the accessibility standards are not met, persons with disabilities, I am not talking about any disability group, we are going through a process in which our citizens from all disability groups, not just those with visual impairment, physical disabilities, orthopedic disabilities, experience serious difficulties. Therefore, in this sense, yes, we have to fulfill our responsibilities as public institutions. We have to do this, but we all know that it is much more valuable, much more effective and much less costly for people working in this field to create and implement their own awareness without the need for any legal sanctions or legal obligations.”

"We provide wage support to employers for the employment of persons with disabilities"

Explaining the free transportation services enjoyed by persons with disabilities, Yanık gave information about the "AILEM Barrier-Free Communication Centre", which they established in this context, informed that they are rapidly carrying out works on digital transformation and barrier-free communication in order to ensure access to the services offered to persons with disabilities with the goal of 100 percent accessibility.

Minister Yanık said that raising awareness, producing and implementing social service policies to facilitate the life of persons with disabilities should be carried out with the coordination of CSOs, universities, municipalities and the private sector as well as public institutions.

Yanık stated that they provided sustainable employment to approximately 1000 persons with disabilities with the "Job Coaching for Persons with Disabilities" application and they aim to expand this model in all provinces within the body of İŞKUR (Turkish Employment Agency), and continued as follows:

“As the Ministry, we provide wage support to employers for the employment of persons with disabilities in sheltered workplaces. In 2012, we broke new ground in the field of disability employment in the public sector and started the central examination system, EKPSS (Public Personnel Selection Examination for Persons with Disabilities). As the Ministry, we cover a part of the application fees for this exam, which is specially prepared for each disability group. Thanks to these policies developed, while the number of persons with disabilities working in the public sector was 5,777 in 2002, today this number has increased 11 times to 66 thousand.”

Explaining that the scope of service models developed for citizens in need of care, such as temporary care, home care allowance, and day care service, continues by being generalized, Yanık said that the monthly amount they paid within the scope of home care allowance they started in 2006, is 3 thousand 336 TL, and that 554 thousand 434 citizens benefit from this support.

Minister Yanık wished that the fair, where solution partnerships will be developed and new technologies will be shared in order to facilitate the lives of persons with disabilities, will be beneficial.

Chairman of Darülaceze Hamza Cebeci, Chairman of Türkiye Beyazay Association Lokman Ayva, representatives of public institutions and organizations and local government representatives also took part in the introduction programme.

At the end of the program, Minister Yanık signed the Manifesto of Barrier-Free Life.