The gap in employment rates between disabled people and the general population has been thrust into the spotlight by coverage in the Financial Times. According to the article, Ireland finds itself in the unenviable position of having the largest gap in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), surpassing perennial laggards such as the United States. 

Fórsa general secretary Kevin Callinan took to social media to call the gap “shameful.” He excoriated the Government saying they have “choices to make.” 

The Financial Times compared Ireland to Chile. Despite being a smaller economy with lower overall employment, Chile has a significantly smaller gap between disabled and general employment rates. The gap was largely credited to government policy, with Chile’s 2018 Labour Inclusion Act receiving the lion’s share of plaudits. The Act places a quota on large organisations requiring one percent of staff to be registered disabled workers. 

The issue of quotas was raised at Biennial Conference last year. Presenting a motion to increase the public sector’s minimum statutory employment target, Fórsa Youth member Brian Dooley said: “The public sector is a leader in employment issues. If we start by requiring public sector organisations to hire disabled staff members, proportional to our existence in the Irish population, we can show inclusive workplaces work.” 

Echoing Brian, Kevin said “Government have the ability to shape the labour market, through their own employment practices and through legislation. This needs to be a wake-up call to look at their policies and make the changes needed, because where we are right now shames us all.” 

Quoted in the article, Emer Begley, director of advocacy and inclusion at the Disability Federation of Ireland, pointed to the issue of the lacklustre uptake of existing government programmes such as the Work and Access programme.  

She cited a reluctance amongst disabled people “to even name the reasonable accommodation they need” as being among the reasons for low uptake.  She explained that disabled people often have to fight hard for accommodations when they do name them. 

This experience was reflected at Biennial Conference by Grace Doyle of the Meath health and local government branch when she described the experience of seeking accommodations as “hitting a brick wall”.  

Begley also took aim at the social welfare system, which does not take into account how disabled people engage with work. Depending on a person’s disability, they may drop in and out of work or prefer to work part-time. This requires giving up Disability Allowance (DA), which is subject to a means test and one of the more difficult payments to successfully apply for. Giving up the disability allowance also means losing access to benefits such as free travel or their medical card. She said: “They may be able to work, but it’s actually that barrier of losing benefits that keeps them out of the labour market.”  

Echoing these points, organisations such as the Irish National Organisation for the Unemployed (INOU) have for some time claimed rigidity in disability allowance further discourages disabled people from entering the workforce.  

According to the INOU, if a disabled person is unsure whether they are able to work but wishes to trial working part-time, they can switch from DA to a part-time unemployment payment. If they then find part-time work is beyond their capabilities, they will have to reapply for DA and risk the period of part-time employment counting against their claim.  

In January of this year, Fórsa’s Disability Matters Working Group delivered its recommendations to the union’s National Executive Committee. These recommendations form the outline of Fórsa’s campaign to improve the conditions of disabled workers going forward.  

Details of the Disability Matters Working Group’s recommendations were previously covered in the members’ bulletin; you can read them here.

Kevin concluded by saying: “Supporting disabled workers has from day one been part of our mission at Fórsa. We are proud that our disabled members have led on this, telling us what they need.” 

He emphasised, “Disability is not inability. Our members show this in their work every day. As a country, we can and must do better.” 

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