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11. If you are not-for-profit, why do you have a positive budget?
12. I have question about the 'R' in EPR. What do you mean by 'Rehabilitation'?
13. Why is 'rehabilitation' important?
14. How do you strive to represent the interests of people with disabilities?
15. What are your objectives in Public Affairs?
16. How do you measure success in your work?
17. You have been around since 1992. What have your achievements been throughout these years?
11. Not-for-profit organisations also have to operate in a business-like manner in order to survive. Having a 'not-for-profit' status does not mean that you make losses, but that your surplus (as we call it) is reinvested back into the budget of the organisation to finance future activities. In other words, surpluses are not distributed to a Board of shareholders as would be the case with companies.
12. 'Rehabilitation' is a term derived from the concept of regaining capacity, restoring function or simply rebuilding one’s own life. It implies that the service is targeted at those who have previously been fully integrated or acting on the basis of full capacity, and who now require, as a result of an illness, injury or other circumstance, to re-attain their previous status. However, in practice, rehabilitation services are provided to people with both developmental and acquired conditions and the distinction is difficult to discern on the ground. An attempt has been made to introduce the concept of ‘habilitation’ as an alternative term for those services targeted at people with developmental disabilities, but the term has failed to gain significant support and is not in regular use.
13. For most people with disabilities, access to adequate (re)habilitation is a condition for integration into society and participation in the communities in which they live. Without rehabilitation many people with disabilities would be isolated from society, their community and even their family. Rehabilitation thus has a key role to play in an inclusive society. The UN Convention on the Rights of People of Disabilities adopted in December 2006 recognised the importance of rehabilitation by including a specific Article 26 on 'Habilitation & Rehabilitation' in the text.
14. This is an important question. It must be underlined that EPR does not aim to represent the interest of people with disabilities but of service providers; EPR does not speak on behalf of people with disabilities. EPR is focused on the service delivery aspect of the sector. Of course, the interest of providers and users coincide on many matters and EPR works actively with representative structures of the disability movement such as the EDF (European Disability Forum) to ensure that we pool our resources in a coordinated manner to achieve better results.
15. The starting point when discussing the aims and objectives of any activity in EPR is that it should serve the main mission of the organisation - providing value for money to its members through concrete services. A secondary overall objective of the EPR is an aspiration to play a 'leading' role in the sector. In this respect, the following four Public Affairs aims and objectives have been prioritised:
16. EPR spends quite a lot of time in evaluating its activities and outputs. The EPR Annual Work Programme includes a number of Key Performance Indicators against each planned activity. The Centre Action Plans are evaluated at the mid-term and the end of each new cycle. Progress of the objectives of the Strategic Framework is reviewed at Executive Committee and Board of Directors meetings and events. In the evaluation of EPR’s Public Affairs activities, we engaged an external consultant to conduct a perception analysis based on interviews with key stakeholders. Finally, evaluation forms from all activities and events are collected and analysed and 'lessons learned' are recorded. The EPR coordinators also evaluate EPR’s package of service at their meetings.
17. EPR can report on a number of achievements in the last 15 years of its operation in the VET and social sector at European level. Some highlights are provided below:
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