Manitoba Disabilities Issues Office
Full Citizenship:
A Manitoba Strategy on Disability
The Challenge
Action Plan 2001
Employment
- The Challenge
Historically, persons with disabilities have been largely excluded from the labour market. The legacy of those policies is all too obvious: 48 per cent of adults with disabilities in Manitoba are unemployed or outside the labour force. Women and Aboriginal persons with disabilities face even greater barriers. In large measure, this is attributable to lower educational attainment, lack of disability supports and lack of workplace accommodation of persons with disabilities. Clearly, there is a need to make education, training and transition programs more flexible and accessible.
While a great deal has been done to integrate students with disabilities into our educational system, there are still difficulties in gaining access to supports needed to allow them to enter or remain in school. Students often find that the only access issues that have been addressed are those relating to physical access. Persons with learning and other cognitive disabilities note that they experience considerable difficulties in gaining access to appropriate and useful training and employment. It should also be noted that persons with disabilities have a right to expect more than access to a job: they need access to real and meaningful career paths.
Much must also be done to accommodate persons with disabilities in the workplace. Accommodation is the modification of a job or workplace to allow for the employment of persons with disabilities. It involves removing the procedural and attitudinal barriers, as well as the physical barriers that persons with disabilities often encounter.
Companies such as Royal Direct and Convergys Customer Care Management Canada are actively recruiting persons with disabilities. Along with other Manitoba companies, they have discovered that providing disability-related job accommodations such as flexible hours of work and disability adaptive equipment is a good business practice.
Unfortunately, many employers are not yet prepared to accommodate the disabilities of workers in their labour force. While the Manitoba Human Rights Code includes an express duty to accommodate ,and Canadian courts, including the Supreme Court, have recognized that this duty exists in Canadian law, there is a lack of information about the various dimensions of accommodation and relatively little assistance to help offset associated costs.
- Action Plan 2001
It is proposed that provincial employment and training programs will provide for disability supports such as disability-related transportation required by Manitobans with disabilities to participate in these programs.
Further, effective planning and action to achieve greater inclusion of persons with disabilities in the labour market will require the engagement of the disabilities community and the support of all Manitobans.
Organizations, such as the Manitoba Business Leadership Network, representing private sector employers in Manitoba, have met with government to discuss partnership collaboration efforts to create opportunities and achieve employment outcomes for more persons with disabilities in Manitoba. Partnerships such as these hold much promise for connecting Manitobans with disabilities seeking employment with employers wanting to hire them.
Our Action Plan proposes that in 2001, community consultation be undertaken to develop policy recommendations for implementation in 2002. Such consultations would focus on how to strengthen employment support policies to:
- Increase employment opportunities and labour market access;
- Encourage employment equity programs in all sectors of the economy;
- Increase the accessibility of education, training and transition mechanisms;
- Increase the provision of work-related supports;
- Encourage workplace accommodation for persons with disabilities;
- Promote work and volunteer opportunities for persons with disabilities; and
Increase support for community economic development and self-employment for persons with disabilities.
