The Gibraltar Local Disability Movement has described the action in the criminal reforms bill in the wording “imbeciles, idiots and defectives" being continued in the Minister for Justice Daniel Feetham proposed Bill as highly offensive to people who have cognitive disabilities and is the continuation of old language in the older law which we still have here in Gibraltar, from the previous legislation, which is the Criminal Offences Act

The new bill, which will now eventually be passed to be debated by Parliament, for the possible adoption into law must remove the out of date terms as in, defectives, imbeciles and idiots,

The Minister for Justice Daniel Feetham may be introducing a new modernised crimes bill probably in 2010 but it is not modern or a comprehensive reform of our criminal justice system in our history if we continue to use the words of our distant past mistakes.

The Gibraltar Local Disability Movement disagreement in the proposed new Crimes Act (programmed for 2010) is in the wording, spokesman of the GLDM adds “when we are dealing with the disabled in a bill which is aimed at equalization in the age of consent, I ask, must we keep this wording where them with a disability are named as, idiots, imbeciles and defectives? This is surely totally unacceptable for the cognitively disabled”

The Gibraltar Local Disability Movement
"Our Success Is A function Of Determination And Ability"