Article on the site of  European Network on Independent Living – ENIL:

Let’s Talk About Personal Assistance

In the Hungarian disability movement, great work was done by many disabled persons and their allies, for example György Könczei, Pál Gadó, Gábor Zalabai, László Hajdi (ZALABAI P-NÉ 1997). Hungarian IL Centers (ÖÉK) were organized in the ‘90s with the aim to support persons with severe disabilities and to offer counselling to professionals (ZALABAI P-NÉ 2009). Magdolna Jelli, a disabled activist herself, was the president of the Disabled Peoples’ Independent Life Association (ÖNÉ). Some of the services she introduced back then, such as the Ferryman Service, which is a peer support group, still work (JELLI M. and HEGYES F. É.N.; https://onalloelet.hu/), but until today, personal assistance (PA) could not be established in a systematic way.

On the 13th November 2018 the Sixth Disability Studies Conference was held in Budapest. The conference was organized by the ELTE University’s Bárczi Gusztáv Faculty of Special Needs Education. We invited Tom Shakespeare as a keynote speaker, who summarized the conclusions of a research project about PA relationships in the UK. His lecture was followed by a panel discussion about the possibilities of introducing PA services in Hungary. Our reason to choose this topic was, that although our state has ratified the UN CRPD in 2007, there are still only a few active PA users in Hungary, who need to finance their assistance completely from their private resources.

As a next step, to better understand the background of the possibilities and difficulties of PA, we invited disabled persons, allies and potential personal assistants to talk about their experiences. As some of the few Hungarian PA users, Zsuzsa Antal, Károly Tóth and Dániel Csángó shared their personal knowledge about the everyday practice of PA. All three speakers are activists and participatory teachers at the ELTE University, working on the social inclusion of persons with disabilities on different levels.

Our goal is to continue the establishment of the Hungarian network of user led PA services by collecting and sharing information and experience regarding PA, to support and disseminate the conclusions of participatory researches on connected issues and to generate discourse in the Hungarian judicial and social context. We aim to generate an empowered local forum which connects international knowledge regarding PA systems with the Hungarian framework to successfully constitute accessible PA services.

JELLI M. and HEGYES F. Disabled Peoples’ Independent Life Association, Budapest, Hungary [on-line – accessed: 01.11.2018]

ZALABAI P-NÉ (1997). Önálló életvitel és személyi segítés (English: Independent Living and Personal Assistance) [on-line – accessed: 01.11.2018]. Esély, Vol. 8., No. 5. pp. 56-70.

ZALABAI P-NÉ (2009). Önálló életvitelt segítő eszközök, munkahelyi akadálymentesítés és munkaeszközök adaptációja. Jegyzet (English: Tools for Independent Living, Workplace Accessibility and Adaption of Work Equipment) [on-line – accessed: 01.11.2018]. ELTE BGGYK, Budapest.

Anikó Sándor, Dániel Csángó, Károly Tóth, Zsuzsanna Antal, Zsuzsanna Kunt

Activists and allies, ELTE University

A year has past, a very active and effective one. Let’s see what had People First HU done in 2018?
We’ve been on a study-tour in Germany and they came here, to Hungary. The association has changed, new Base Rules, new presidency, new plans, the number of our members is continuously increasing. We’ve set our bilingual website, students are doing community service with us, we’re sensitizing here and there. We’re applying and winning, we’re partners in international projects, we took part in develop the city’s Equal Opportunities Program. We’re forming relationships in Hungary and abroad, we’re taking part in campaigns even abroad. And we’re getting together everytime we can to just enjoy each other! We’ll continue this in 2019! 🙂
If you’re interested, join or follow us!

We held a great and cosy open year-end general assembly yesterday in Speckó – thanks for our member Pintér Csaba. We talked about how much did we do this year and a future task.

Yes, a lot of things we did this year: the association transformed, we take part in national and international projects/campaigns, won an application, made contract with two high schools about the students community service, we have logo and website, participated in writing of the local Equal Opportunities Program 2018-2023, we had a serious role  of the organising the II. Barrier-free Tourism Day, we have new Hungarian and international partnerships, our members are open, active and more and more professional!

Special thanks to our outside enthusiasts for participating in the general assembly and welcome our new members!

The People First Association participate in an international project, its first kick-off meeting was held between 30.11.-03.12.2018 in Barcelona and Corbera.  The “Peer-Act” Erasmus+ KA2 project  is a program with the participation of five countries (Germany, Spain, Italy, Hungary, Croatia), the main objective of the project is the training of Peer Counselor trainers from the community of disabled people or people with special needs, with providing inclusion and equal opportunities. You can read more about this project in our website here: http://peoplefirst.hu/en/projects/peer-act-erasmus-ka2-nemzetkozi-project/

The People First Association – Pécs participate in the campaign inKLOsiv between 19.11.-03.12.2018 to draw attention how important are barrier-free toilets to the disabled people. By joining the international campaign we are already on the website of wheelmap.org. Direction the world!                                                                                                 Places we sent: I Love Pécs Café and Janus Office Building. Thank you!

We are very happy to announce that our Association has won with the project called “Pécs is livable as a barrier-free city” at the Pécsi Community Foundation,  “Pécs’s future foundation 2018 Community Creativity projects”.
We are even happier to tell that out of the 17 projects that were handed in we’re one of the 3 that they decided to support.

About the project in a nutshell:
Two of the members of People First Association – Pécs  (a handicapped and an able bodied person) are visiting all of the restaurants and cafes in the downtown area of Pécs to map the barrier-free places. They will talk to the owners to let put a sticker – which we designed – on the doors just like Visa or MasterCard. The sticker is 10×10 size, not ostentatious, not too colorful, not distracting but shows that the place is barrier-free so handicapped people can easily enjoy what the place has to offer just like other people.

In case the place has a truly (not only in the image of society “no stairs, so it must be barrier-free”) barrier-free toilet – which is because of basic needs is just as important as it is with our able bodied fellow-creature – a WC sign appears in the lower right corner of the sticker as well. If the toilet isn’t barrier-free, the WC sign appears crossed on the sticker. This is not discriminatory, this is information for our disabled people and to prevent incidental disappointment. But it’s expected to cause an incinting effect on the owner of the place to make the toilet barrier-free in the future.

In return the Association does not expect any financial compensation from the restaurants/cafés, moreover we will display it in a map-mode on our website, as well as through the wheelmap.org website all over the world (!), and we would like to achieve it similarly on the urban media sites.

Later we will extend this project to food and clothing stores.

All of this greatly contributes Pécs, as an assessment of barrier-free livable city, it’s also a tourist attractant factor, because our disabled people are travelling the same amount and with the same enthusiasm like everyone else. Especially if a city specifically encourages them to do so and if they type Pécs on the international wheelmap.org they will be welcomed by many barrier-free restaurants/cafés that we have evaluated.

The Boccia Hungarian Championship is ended today. The 9 sportsman of the Pécs PTE PEAC Lendület team played 46 matches and won 34! For the Pécs team it is the all time best play. Congratulations to all, including our association members: the national team member Gergő Berkes (bronze medal), Balázs Oláh (12.place) and as we think the best referee Dávid Belán! 🙂 Keep it up!

The People First Association Pécs made a contract with the Leőwey Klára Highschool of Pécs, so from the 9/b English class some kind and enthusiastic students work with us on their compulsory community service. As we see, the handiest and the best students applied as a volunteer to us, so we can give them some variegate jobs: they participate in a boccia team’s trainings and competitions, they are animator at the Speckó special sensitizing escape-game-room, translate in English,  help and escort some disabled people,  participate at some sensitizing trainings, gathering… and everything else 🙂 Thank you Alex, Barni, Barnabás, GG and Panna!

https://www.facebook.com/172288729567705/videos/885597291570175/UzpfSTExMjc3NzQ1NTQ3OTU5NDoxOTgzOTA2MjQ1MDMzMzYz/