CAAMAÑO VALLE v. SPAIN JUDGMENT – SEPARATE OPINION majority of States Parties to Protocol No. 1 unreservedly agreed with the principles contained in the CRPD.2 9. A different question is to what extent the States Parties also live up to the obligations to which they have committed themselves by ratifying the CRPD. The majority refer to a report adopted in 2014 by the European Union Fundamental Rights Agency (hereafter, “the FRA”; see paragraphs 27 and 59 of the judgment). At that time only seven of the 28 EU Member States guaranteed the right to vote for all persons, including those without legal capacity. The FRA considered this to be a problematic situation, referring to the concerns expressed by the CRPD Committee (FRA, The right to political participation for persons with disabilities: human rights indicators, 2014, 39-41). It reminded the States concerned of the need to “amend national legislation depriving people of the right to vote based on a disability, or a proxy such as assessed ‘capacity’” (ibid., 8). In a later report, adopted in 2019, the FRA noted “slow but steady progress in realising the right to vote for all” (FRA, Who will (not) get to vote in the 2019 European Parliament elections? Developments in the right to vote of people deprived of legal capacity in EU Member States, 2019, 3; see paragraph 28 of the judgment). Based on its analysis of reforms at the national level linked to the ratification of the CRPD, the FRA found that the reforms “demonstrate a clear trend towards reducing restrictions on the right to vote of people with disabilities deprived of legal capacity” (ibid., 3). Spain in particular was mentioned, as the State in which “the most comprehensive removal of restrictions to the right to vote took place” (ibid., 3; see the reference to the 2018 reform in paragraphs 19 and 68 of the judgment). In my opinion, if anything can be learnt from the FRA reports, it is that there is a “slow but steady” trend to align national legislation with the CRPD, that is, to implement the obligations arising from the CRPD in domestic law. 10. Fourthly, I regret that the majority do not take the same approach as two other independent bodies of the Council of Europe. The first body I am referring to is the Venice Commission. The majority quote from the Code of Good Practice in Electoral Matters, adopted by the Commission in 2002 (see paragraph 26 of the judgment). The Code allows This same agreement is also reflected in Recommendation CM/Rec(2011)14 of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe on the participation of persons with disabilities in political and public life, adopted on 16 November 2011. One of the principles which should guide the Member States in adopting the appropriate legislative measures is that “all persons with disabilities, whether they have physical, sensory, or intellectual impairments, mental health problems or chronic illnesses, have the right to vote on the same basis as other citizens, and should not be deprived of this right by any law limiting their legal capacity, by any judicial or other decision or by any other measure based on their disability, cognitive functioning or perceived capacity” (Appendix to the recommendation, point 3, on “non-discrimination in the exercise of legal capacity”). 2 31