The European Card for Persons with Disabilities will soon be recognized throughout the EU. The European Parliament and the Council of the EU have reached an agreement on this.
Thursday, February 8, 2024 at 2:16 PM
With a European Disability Card (EDC), people with disabilities can enjoy benefits from cultural, sports or leisure activities. Anyone who has such a card in Belgium can immediately use it in seven other countries that have been participating in a European pilot project since 2017: Cyprus, Estonia, Finland, Italy, Malta, Slovenia and Romania.
It has now been decided that this card will be recognized throughout the European Union. It remains the individual member states that issue the card. At the same time, the format of the European parking card for people with disabilities is being standardized.
“Belgium is convinced of the benefits that the EDC card can bring to people with disabilities throughout the European Union and that is why we were among the pioneers who promoted the expansion of the EDC to all Member States,” said Belgian Federal Minister for Social Affairs Integration Karine Lalieux, who is also in charge of Persons with disabilities. “The agreement between Parliament, the Commission, and the Council of the EU will ensure that this wish becomes reality in the near future.”
In Belgium, anyone who receives recognition of their disability has been automatically offered a disability card since the beginning of this year. “Today, more than 202,000 people in our country are entitled to the EDC card, which they can use with 464 partners,” says Lalieux. “With automatic issuance coming into effect on January 1, 2024, there is no doubt that the card will be even more widely circulated in the future.”
