News

Improved rights for disabled people could create thousands of job opportunities at local authorities, including social services departments.

From December 2006, government departments, councils and some private and voluntary sector service providers will have a specific duty to integrate the needs of disabled people into their policies and plans.

Campaigners hope the new duty, under the Disability Discrimination Act 2005, will result in local authorities taking a more positive approach to recruiting disabled people and ensuring they are more desirable environments to work in.


Simone Aspis, campaigns officer for the British Council of Disabled People, says: "Public bodies will be required to promote jobs more widely by advertising in specific disability magazines or with disability organisations."

She says the new duty should encourage local authorities to adapt jobs to the needs of individuals and offer more workplace support.

"The way work is organised does stop some disabled people getting into employment," Aspis says. "If someone becomes disabled through an accident everything should be done to keep them within their existing role or find a new one within the organisation. For example, it is often specified that social workers need to drive but most of the skills for the job aren't about that."

The Employers Organisation for local government has been looking at job remodelling. Jane Wren, head of diversity, says: "We've looked at whether some parts of jobs traditionally done by someone with certain skills and qualifications can be done by someone else without them or whether we can give someone the skills. It has worked well in the education sector and is a matter of getting the job to fit the person."


Wren says she hopes the new public duty will bring more disabled people into the sector but warns proving it so could be difficult. "There are no base line figures so will be difficult to show. Part of the problem is that some people that don't have a visible disability might not be prepared to declare it."

Under the legislation, people with some chronic illnesses, including cancer and HIV, will be classed as disabled.

Wren hopes the focus will not be so much on employing more disabled people but on promotion opportunities.

But Aspis is optimistic that the new act will encourage flexibility in recruitment. "By providing more training opportunities and recognising transferable skills people may have gained through previous jobs or from experiences as a service user perhaps it will help them consider a career in the sector."