Does a needs‐led delivery of services undermine disability discrimination principles?

In this article we contrast the use of a needs‐led approach to the provision of care services with one based on a right not to suffer discrimination. We demonstrate how a needs‐led approach must inevitably be constrained by budgetary considerations and can therefore never be absolute. This is turn will lead to situations in which people are left out of provision, which raises the question: Have they suffered discrimination? But non‐discrimination approaches to service delivery also create difficulties as they require an individual to identify the nature of their ‘difference’ from others, in order to establish discrimination based upon that ‘difference’. This dilemma of difference can undercut the very notions of equality and equal treatment that underpin the core philosophy of the anti‐discrimination approach.