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PERSPECTIVE article

Front. Rehabil. Sci.

Sec. Disability, Rehabilitation, and Inclusion

Volume 6 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fresc.2025.1650487

This article is part of the Research TopicAssistive Technologies in Aging and DisabilityView all 13 articles

Operationalising Article 13 of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities: The role of assistive technology in ensuring access to justice

Provisionally accepted
  • Maynooth University, Maynooth, Ireland

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

Access to justice is a determinant of the realisation of all other rights, including the right to health, employment, and education. As persons with disabilities experience increased discrimination and social exclusion and are at higher risk of violence than people without disabilities, it is crucial to ensure access to justice in both the civil and criminal legal spheres for people with disabilities. However, persons with disabilities experience multiple barriers at the macro/structural and individual levels to accessing justice. In light of the significance of access to justice for people with disabilities, and the multiple barriers to accessing justice experienced by those with disabilities, this perspective examines the importance of assistive technology in fulfilling the right to access justice. To fulfill the right of access to the justice system, assistive technologies must be more effectively harnessed to provide equitable access to justice for persons with disabilities.

Keywords: Disability, Access to justice, Assistive Technology, Assistive products, Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities

Received: 18 Jul 2025; Accepted: 13 Oct 2025.

Copyright: © 2025 McVeigh. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

* Correspondence: Joanne McVeigh, joanne.mcveigh@mu.ie

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