During the last ten years, qualitative changes in the ideology of disability support have occurred - the morally outdated medical model of disability has been substituted gradually by a model based on social and human rights, aiming at full and equal-standing integration of the disabled persons in the society.
The goal of the policy of equal rights for disabled persons is to achieve the understanding that the role of disabled persons in the development of the society is acknowledged as equally valuable to the roles of the other members of the society. That is, these persons have equal rights and equal responsibilities, and equal access to the resources is ensured. Providing equal opportunities to persons with disabilities is a way how to facilitate their integration in the society - providing support for implementing the comprehensive policies that would consider the principles of full civil participation and independent life of disabled persons would facilitate the removal of all the obstacles - psychological, educational, familiar, cultural, social, professional, financial and environmental -to the integration. The equality of opportunities means also to provide accessibility in physical, informational and cultural environments, access to housing, transport, social and medical services, education and employment regardless of person's age or disability.
Facilitating the integration of the disabled persons into the social life and labour market is a valuable gain both for the disabled persons themselves and for the whole society. Thus the intellectual, creative and labour potential of the disabled persons is appreciated and invested for the welfare of the society. That is especially important in the context of the ageing society that can bring a substantial decrease of the labour resources in the future.
The Ministry of Welfare within its competences provides the supervision of the implementation of the policy of equal opportunities for the disabled persons in the so-called "horizontal level", that is, in cooperation with the NGOs of disabled persons and the National Council of Disability Affairs performing the analysis of the policy, providing proposals for other institutions of state administration and government on different issues regarding the improvement of the quality of life for the disabled persons, overlooking the implementation of the principle of equal opportunities in every area of policies, including the use of European structural funds, as well as provides the supervision of the organization of the disability expertise in this country.