INTERNATIONAL DISABILITY ALLIANCE (IDA)
Member Organisations:
Disabled Peoples' International, Down Syndrome International, Inclusion
International, International Federation of Hard of Hearing People,
World Blind Union, World Federation of the Deaf,
World Federation of the DeafBlind,
World Network of Users and Survivors of Psychiatry,
Arab Organization of Disabled People, European Disability Forum,
Latin American Network of Non-Governmental Organizations of Persons with
Disabilities and their Families, Pacific Disability Forum
Employment
There are one billion persons with disabilities worldwide, according to the world
report on disability (World Bank and WHO). The majority of people with disabilities
have faced discrimination in terms of unequal access to employment, compared to
those without disabilities.
According to the World Report on Disability (World Bank & WHO, 2011) the
unemployment rate among people with disabilities is twice the level of the nondisabled population in developed countries and more than 80% of people with
disabilities are estimated to be un- or underemployed in developing countries.
The major contributing factors include ignorance and failure to provide
reasonable accommodations that would allow qualified individuals to perform the
essential functions of their job.
Persons with disabilities face stereotypes, marginalization and often patronizing
responses from managers, colleagues and employers.
On the other hand, people with disabilities are often successful when having
opportunities for small business developments and thus there is a need for making
micro-credits and similar programs accessible to persons with disabilities. Finally,
persons with disabilities have a higher retention rate when employed.
Crosscutting nature of disability
As mentioned persons with disabilities face discrimination in wide range of domains
such as education, personal mobility, access to physical and communications
infrastructure, housing, healthcare, and access to government services. Because of
these barriers persons with disabilities who would otherwise be valued and
productive workers are often unavailable to the job market. For example, a person
lacking certain educational prerequisites, for example, will be not qualified for many
quality jobs. If a public bus system is inaccessible to wheelchairs, would-be
workers who use wheelchairs will be unable to commute to work
Lack of decent employment leads persons with disabilities, almost universally,
to have lower incomes and own less property than persons without
disabilities. Persons with disabilities are very often in the situation of poverty
or extreme poverty. Because of additional costs related to disability, persons
with disabilities spend a greater percentage of their income and resources to pay for
goods and services than persons without disabilities. Income earned from
employment can substantially mitigate the incidence of poverty and reduce the
overall costs borne by state parties in poverty reduction programs.
Social protection
Social protection and social assistance programs need to be grounded in the
human rights approach, specifically as outlined by the Convention on the
rights of persons with disabilities.
In achieving this, social protection needs to be understood as social
participation to prevent measures that will promote a ‘charity’ approach and to
account for disability related cost.
These programs need to be part of the wider support framework for persons with
disabilities, to include employment, education and other rights.
Of particular importance is the relation between social protection and employment
programs. Social protection programs need to promote and support employment
while refraining from any conditionality or penalization of beneficiaries.
We would like to support the initiative surrounding Social protection floor,
but it needs to further facilitate participation. The reason being is that there is
participation cost related to disability (provision of wheelchairs, services,
transportation, personal assistance and communication services) that has to be
taken into account when formulating poverty level or minimal social and economic
well-being for persons with disabilities.
Finally, persons with disabilities and their representative organizations need to be
included in the design, implementation and evaluation of employment and social
protection programs.
Recommendations:
The new sustainable development framework must enable a focus on the poorest,
most marginalised groups, such as persons with disabilities, ensuring their
effective participation in all stages of the process including in the negotiation
phase.
The framework needs to be driven by the human rights-based approach, with
equality and non-discrimination as priority themes. To ensure this leads to
concrete action, there should be a stand-alone goal on equality and nondiscrimination, as well as the obligations to pursue these principles across the new
framework.
The goals of the new framework have to be disaggregated by social groups including
persons, children and youth with disabilities. In accordance to the High-Level Panel
on Post 2015 Development Agenda report, in the new development
framework the goals will be considered achieved only when they are achieved
for every income and social group. Disability inclusive indicators