“Council of Europe and the role of National Human Rights Institutions, Equality bodies and Ombudsman offices in promoting equality and social inclusion”

Council of Europe Conference organised in cooperation with the Finland's National Human Rights Institution* (Finnish NHRI)

10-11 December 2015

Venue: Finlandia Hall, Helsinki, Finland

The National Human Rights Institutions, Equality Bodies and Ombudsman offices play a crucial role on the national level in improving access to rights and ensuring the implementation of national and international policies, laws and commitments. Therefore, it is important for governments and the Council of Europe as a pan-European actor to support these bodies to improve access to rights and, in turn, strengthen the fight against discrimination, stereotypes and violence.

The event focuses on good examples on how national human rights bodies can work together to break boundaries and remove stereotypes existing in societies in order to enable access to all human rights by all persons. It also aims at discussing the extent to which national bodies can support international and regional intergovernmental organisations, and vice versa, in their work against stereotypes and discrimination and improve the state of Human Rights in Europe.

The event is aimed at representatives of the Council of Europe member States, National Human Rights Institutions, Equality Bodies and Ombudsmen offices and their networks, International organisations, European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA), European Institute for Gender Equality  (EIGE), national, regional and local NGOs, as well as civil society and related networks.

The conference will serve as the 2nd thematic event to implement the terms of reference of the CDDECS to “contribute to the promotion of solidarity and protection of human dignity, equality and equal opportunities for all, and the prevention and combatting of violence and discrimination on any ground”. The first such event was organised in Inari, Finland in November 2014 entitled “Sami, the people, the culture and the languages”.

* Finland's National Human Rights Institution consists of the Parliamentary Ombudsman, the Human Rights Centre and its Human Rights Delegation. National Human Rights Institutions (NHRIs) are independent and autonomous statutory bodies that promote and protect human rights. They have to fulfil the Paris Principles outlined by the UN. According to the Paris Principles, national human rights institutions should e.g. be autonomous, independent and have a pluralist and broad-based composition. The Finnish NHRI was accredited with the highest possible status (A status) in December 2014. NHRIs that are granted an A status have the right to speak at the UN Human Rights Council as well as right to vote in the International Coordinating Committee of National Human Rights Institutions (ICC).

What happened at the Conference....

* (As a basic requirement for using ones human rights is the knowledge of those rights. Rightsinfo is an award winning online site which was launched in April 2015. It has received over 500,000 page views since then. RightsInfo is about bringing human rights to life using beautiful infographics, stories and social media. The project is the brainchild of leading barrister Adam Wagner, founder of the acclaimed UK Human Rights Blog. In 2015, RightsInfo won the prestigious Plain English Communicator Award. RightsInfo is also about using social media to find new ways to talk about and deliver human rights stories and information. We believe there is huge potential to do a better job at explaining why human rights matter and how they can change people’s lives.)

** (HELP is the European Programme for Human Rights Education for Legal Professionals. It supports the Council of Europe (CoE) member states in implementing the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) at the national level, in accordance with the Committee of Ministers Recommendation (2004) 4, the 2010 Interlaken Declaration and the 2012 Brighton Declaration. This is done enhancin the capacity of judges, lawyers and prosecutors in all 47 member states to apply the ECHR in their daily work.)

*** Clarity is an interactive online tool. Its pilot version was launched by FRA in October 2015.  Clarity, which stands for the ‘Complaints, Legal Assistance and Rights Information Tool for You’, allows users to easily access information on non-judicial bodies dealing with their particular fundamental rights issue(s) in a given EU Member State.