5 The UN Convention On Protecting The Rights Of People With Disabilities
7 Questionnaire To Be Issued After The General Assembly In October
Rodolfo Cattani (chair)
Tony Aston
Christakis Nicolaides
FRED Reid
Yvonne Toros
The chairman welcomed the employment
experts to this technical discussion and thanked them for attending. Referring
to the agenda he had circulated by e-mail, he proposed the addition of two more
items subsequently suggested by CN. These were:
(a) the value of reserved occupations for employment of blind and ps people;
(b) welfare benefits as a disincentive to blind and ps seeking employment.
AGREED to add these topics to the agenda. [NOTE: as will be seen below, items
were not taken in the order shown and the topic of ‘reserved occupations’ was
never reached.]
Continuing, the chairman reminded the meeting of the topics included in his
original agenda before expanding it as above:
I) Evaluation of the outcomes of the conference, The Challenge of the Labour
Market-Plan Early, Act Right, Achieve High, held at LANARCA, Cyprus, 10-11
November, 2006.
(Ii) The UN convention on protecting the rights of people with disabilities. How
can it be use to further EBU's aims?
(Iii) Reform of the European Union legislation on state aid. It was noted that
RC had circulated to members of this group copies of the questionnaire prepared
by EDF. He thanked RNIB for its valuable response to this questionnaire, which
EBU would be able to use as a guide in drawing up its own. This should
supplement, from the point of view of blind and ps people, the position paper
which EDF intends to submit to the EU Commission after it has received responses
to its questionnaire.
FR noted that RC had referred to an EDF ‘‘contribution’ on state aid which had
been prepared before the questionnaire. He had not received that document.
ACTION: RC undertook to circulate the document.
In the course of a long discussion the following points were made:
Disincentives to work are for blind and ps people partly financial, partly
psychological.
EBU's view is that ‘benefits should not be put into question when people with
disabilities go to work’. But this refers to disability compensation, not to
income substitution benefits.
CN in particular thought that ‘generous benefits’ are in fact a disincentive.
It was pointed out that the disincentive effect is widely thought to operate but
is really quite difficult to demonstrate from the available evidence. E.g. the
number of blind and ps people employed in the UK since about 1970 had grown
while, at the same time, a system of disability compensation had been introduced
by statute.
It was felt that EBU could not reach a satisfactory conclusion on the
disincentive effect of benefits without the aid of professional research.
RC said that, In October, 2007, EBU will consider the reports from its technical
groups, including this one. It will then issue a questionnaire to its members. A
question on this subject could be included. Professional research could then
follow.
It was pointed out that some research had already been done, e.g. for the Uk,
Lithuania and the CZEK Republic and this should be reviewed in advance of
commissioning new research. Reference was made to a conference held in
Washington D.C. with the support of Cornell University in 2001, at which this
topic had been exhaustively considered in relation to people with disabilities
in the USA.
ACTION: RC to report this discussion to EBU with a view proceeding by the
following steps:
(i) collect and circulate the three reports concerning UK, Lithuania and the
CZEK Republic;
(ii) include a question on this subject in the forthcoming EBU questionnaire.
(iii) EBU Board may then consider whether professional research would be needed.
RC went on to point out a possible danger of proceeding in this manner: ‘if
research proved that benefits are a disincentive, what would EBU recommend?’
TA thought it would depend how we expressed our conclusion in the light of that
hypothesis. It could be given a positive expression, i.e. that benefits can be
structured in such a way as to promote employment of people with disabilities.
He thought, in general, taxation, family supplements, etc. should all be
structured to this end. No doubt such a re-structuring would be very complicated
to achieve, but the principle is simple.
CN thought we should be more concrete. He outlined recent benefit improvements
for blind and ps people in Cyprus. Now the problem is that many blind and ps
people do not want to seek employment. It would be a task for his Association to
encourage its members to do so.
It was pointed out that the disincentives might be other than financial. The
jobs open to blind and ps people are not attractive. They often yield only low
remuneration.
RC considered that the problem of low pay should be addressed by providing a
disability compensation benefit. He thought disability compensation should be
increased if a blind or ps person entered employment, since there are special
costs of doing so, e.g. transport. Thus in Italy, the income substitution
benefit is low and the disability compensation is high. Taken together they make
up the equivalent of a normal salary. This means that blind and ps people can
‘stay at home and survive’. but The Italian Association believes that people do
not like to stay at home.
When asked, RC said that there was no defined minimum salary in Italy. In Cyprus
a minimum salary is defined by law.
Ta again asked why EBU should be urging blind and ps people to take low paid,
low skilled jobs, in which They will be little better off (if at all), more
stressed and bored to death. Should society not concentrate on helping those who
have the ability or motivation to go to work that gives them the opportunity to
improve their financial and social satisfactions?
It was pointed out in answer to this that in many countries blind and ps people
still receive no benefits and if they cannot work they must live in misery and
dependence.
TA thought this might point to the need for a different campaign: all EU
countries to legislate for a minimum standard of living.
FR thought the group was mixing up two questions here: (a) Why work? (b) If
working, how high should disability compensation be. He thought the evidence
would show that there were both disincentives and incentives. Low financial
reward did not always seem to act as a disincentive. E.g. women acting as lone
parents seem often to take low paid work because it yielded non-financial
satisfactions.
But if a person with a disability took low paid work where the disability
compensation benefit was low, there would be little improvement in his/ her
finances and probably not much possibility of obtaining satisfactions from the
disability compensation benefit, which would be diverted to income support.
AGREED that this discussion could not be taken further by this meeting. Further
advance would require a resolution of the EBU General Assembly. RC thought we
should be careful at this point about recommending one solution rather than
another. It should be left to the national level because The situations are so
different in each country..
TA thought EBU could be very clear about the principles. E.g. the right to work
is a fundamental principle. Its resolution needs action at four levels: Eu,
national, local and the individual. EBU should only act on the level where it
can have influence, i.e. at EU level and at the level of our national members.
he thought There was not much more EBU could do.
FR said he agreed with TA, but he was uneasy about using the expression ‘the
right to work. It has the sanction of historical usage on behalf of the
unemployed, but it cannot be implemented in a capitalist economy
All that could be demanded was the right to compete for work on (as far as
possible) equal terms with non-disabled people. FR referred to chapter six of
the RNIB report, Work Matters (2001).
CN agreed about the right to work and thought the question ‘Why work’ more
interesting. Many blind and ps people complain vigourously and publicly about
having no job, phoning radio chat shows for example, but are perfectly unwilling
to seek employment so long as they can draw their benefits.
It was pointed out that blind people today often have additional disabilities.
Moreover, The people who participate in the associations of the blind are
increasingly ps. The Italian Association now includes members with 70 percent of
normal sight. If they did not do so they would have very few members. It should
also be remembered that 75 percent are older people.
It is necessary to campaign for benefits for ps and older people.
It was felt that EBU should be clear as to the importance of employment. TA
thought it one way to achieve an inclusive life, though not necessarily the best
way for everyone. EBU should stress the benefits of inclusion and recognise that
work is only one way to achieve them.
RC thought that the discussion had also raised another question: do we accept
that the right to work (as qualified above) must extend to all adults with
disabilities regardless of age? He would like to see it apply even to adults
with cognitive problems. He believed very strongly that employment is necessary
to inclusion. E.G. you cannot go to the theatre if you do not work. Other
provision such as voluntary help is not really inclusion.
It was suggested that all that could be covered by the statement that noone is
in principle unemployable.
Some discussants could not accept this statement.
RC thought EBU should not take a position on this yet. It will require a
resolution of the General Assembly.
CN asked whether benefit should be reduced if a blind or ps person refused to go
to work. RC thought that should be a matter for the ‘individual level’. FR
thought it was not so simple as that. How could blind and ps people clamour for
effective employment services to be established at the taxpayers expense and
then turn round and say it should be left to the individual to take them or
leave them? If government perceived that to be their attitude, it would not
provide the services. There was much evidence in the UK to show that government
was only interested in large disabled groups such as people with learning
difficulties (nearly one million).
In discussion of this point, some members of the group thought freedom of choice
must always remain for the individual.
Others thought the issue would not go away.
CN: agreed that it was a difficult question, which he has had to face in Cyprus.
Government there wanted to know how many people he thought actually wanted a
proposed service. FR remarked that small countries like Cyprus could prove to be
very valuable as laboratories for testing such questions. In some larger
countries like uk it was very difficult to collect the data for putting
employment questions to the test. He thought EBU should ask its members in every
country to press for better data on blind and sighted people.
AGREED that the discussion had been very valuable for raising a number of issues
of concern to EBU. These were summarised as follows:
* (i) right to work means Right to compete on equal terms with non-disabled
people.
* 2 Benefits should not be structured in such a way as to act as barriers to
work
* 3 Disability compensation benefits should never be reduced when a person with
disabilities takes employment.
* 4 There should be no compulsion to enter upon paid employment.
* 5 Employment should be clearly recognised as one important means to inclusion.
* 6 The right to work must be implemented by action on the four levels
identified in the discussion. EBU should concentrate on influencing EU
Commission and its own members.
* 7 There should be state funding for equipment and personal support at the work
place.
* 8 EU Commission should stimulate collection of all necessary data to promote
the employment of blind and ps people.
4,1 RC outlined the reasons why the EU had decided to review regulations for
‘general exemption’ from the requirement laid on member states to report any
state aid they gave to businesses. EDF had asked to be included in the
consultation and had produced a discussion document. It had followed this by
issuing a questionnaire to its members. Responses had been requested by 11 May.
He had asked for this to be extended to 21 May to allow this meeting to consider
an appropriate response by EBU.
RC went on to say that EDF had set out four objectives in a preface to the
questionnaire, as follows
1. To improve regulation in order to create a better system to produce
incentives towards the inclusion of people with disabilities in the mainstream
labour market.
2. To ensure that all the support needed on the work environment as well as in
the recruitment is included in the description of the State Aids to support
employment.
3. To ensure that the current regulation support adequately sheltered workshops
to become instruments for better inclusion of people with disabilities in the
mainstream labour market.
(i) to achieve a satisfactory definition of a ‘sheltered workshop’.
(ii) To identify the costs of sheltered employment that are appropriate for
state aid?
(iii) To discover how such costs are calculated in the member countries?
(iv) To consider whether the list currently offered by EU is sufficient?
RC again noted that RNIB had completed a response to the questionnaire at the
request of FR and asked if EBU should just go along with it.
The following points were raised in discussion:
The RNIB response as it stood was too specific to uk, but could be taken as a
basis. (AGREED)
FR thought the response very good as far as it went but there was a silence in
it regarding the recent attempt in the UK to close down Remploy, the national
system of sheltered employment for people with disabilities, and move the
existing labour force to mainstream supported employment. He said RNIB had
suggested, during the consultative process, that Remploy businesses should be
converted into social enterprises operating as ‘centres for supported
employment’, which could work to progress not only the existing Remploy labour
force but all economically inactive disabled people who wanted to work in
mainstream supported employment.
Doubts were expressed about this approach and questions raised about sheltered
employment in the UK:
It was said to be a myth that sheltered workshops had provided for blind and ps
people with additional disabilities. . By and large they had always employed
blind people of ‘middling abilities’. The East European experience under
Communism was no longer relevant. Therefore there was no longer a case for
sheltered workshops as a means to employ blind and ps people with additional
difficulties. Mainstream supported employment could be of some value to them,
but experience proved that very few have been able/ allowed to participate.
It was also suggested that there was great difficulty in defining sheltered
employment. In Italy sheltered workshops offered activity that was more
therapeutic than economically productive.
FR replied that he understood and agreed with the points made. However the
problem, as he saw it, was whether businesses like Remploy should simply be
closed or whether they should be reformed so as to provide support for exactly
the kind of mainstream supported employment that discussants had identified. He
refer to the RNIB report The Employment Continuum (2003), which had set out the
case for centres for supported employment, . It had noted the Blindcraft factory
in Glasgow as a sheltered workshop which had been reformed to provide support
for workers who wished to progress to mainstream employment. When asked he
confirmed that Blindcraf, and the workshop at Merthyr Tidfil in south Wales,
offered these programmes to blind people with additional disabilities and had
been successful in placing them in the mainstream. He also instanced the
Norwegian programme, ‘Work with Support’ which had the highest rate of
progression in Europe and provided a model that could be followed for blind and
ps people with additional disabilities. He suggested EBU should stop using the
term ‘sheltered workshop’ and press for ‘centres for supported employment’ and
for existing workshops to be reformed along these lines.
agreed that sheltered workshops should not be closed before considering such a
reform. RC asked whether the proposed centres would act as places of permanent
employment or just provide a starting point for progression. He acknowledged
that the EBU Board was already in support of mainstreaming and had pressed upon
the EU Commission that special provision (of which centres would form one type)
was the necessary complement of mainstreaming if blind and ps people with
additional disabilities were to be assisted to progress.
TA accepted that this might be one way to proceed and suggested a case could be
made out for it as ‘reasonable accommodation’, a principle which could cover
wage subsidy. It should be remembered that ‘centres’ would have to vary with
local circumstances. In large conurbations like Glasgow a factory might be the
appropriate size. Elsewhere a smaller provision might be more appropriate.
After further discussion it was AGREED to use the Rnib response as a basis for
the EBU response to the questionnaire. ACTION FR should amend it along the lines
of the briefing paper which EBU submitted to the Employment and Social
Directorate in March, 2007, so as to cover the points made in the foregoing
discussion.
FR drew attention to the recent review of sheltered provision in Spain, which he
recommended as a very thorough piece of work.
AGREED to record the following points of agreement:
* 1 In promoting employment opportunities for blind and ps people, special
provision and mainstreaming are complementary approaches.
* 2. The closure of sheltered workshops before full consideration has been given
to their possible reform as centres for supported employment should be resisted.
* 3 There is need to encourage as much experiment as possible in the provision
of special programmes for promoting supported mainstream employment for blind
and ps people who need it.
* 4 In furthering points 1-3 above, the principle of ‘reasonable accommodation’
should always be borne in mind.
* 5 So should the need for flexibility of provision to meet local circumstances.
[Afternote On 22 March the UK government announced that up to half of the
Remploy factories would be closed and the workers transferred to mainstream
supported employment.]"
4,2 At the invitation of the chairman, the meeting turned to examination of the
specific questions in the EDF questionnaire. The following approaches were
agreed:
* Question 1: Follow RNIB response.
* Throughout, do not stress the Uk specific programme, ‘Access to Work’, but
express its general principles.
* On the question how costs are calculated we have no more information to
provide.
AGREED that the expression ‘reduced productivity’ is stigmatising.
NOTED that a form of ‘functional assessment’ is in process of introduction as
part of the current benefit reform. It is perhaps difficult to see how this can
be resisted if blind and ps people demand impairment-specific programmes to
support them into employment. AGREED that while EBU may find functional
assessment acceptable if it promoted people into work, it should ‘resist the
clinic’.
AGREED that any support supplied to a blind or ps person in employment should
continue as long as it was needed, i.e. there should be no time limitation of
state aid in this instance.
Finally, it was felt that employment protection law was a better way to deal
with the problem of the time limiting the sixty percent subsidy.
THIS discussion having concluded, the chairman asked if FR could produce a short
position paper for the Commission based on the RNIB response as discussed.
ACTION: FR to prepare this short position paper.
The chairman invited TA to present his views on the question whether this
Convention could be used by EBU to support its employment objectives and,
equally, how it can be used at national level. At present EBU does not see how
European governments could be persuaded to implement if they are unwilling to do
so. Many are disinclined and it may be that they are right where implementation
would mean a diminution of services to blind and ps people.
TA outlined the process by which the UN Convention to Protect the Rights of
People with Disabilities had been first conceived and finally agreed between
2002 and 2006. He also indicated how disabled people had been involved. He then
explained the ‘underpinning principles’, which include the following: Disability
is a rights issue, i.e. people with disabilities have rights and are not ‘just a
problem’. Their dignity, autonomy and independence must be respected. They have
a right to make choices. They should not be subjected to discrimination.
That said, it has to be noted that the convention introduces no more rights than
exist in other UN conventions and treaties. It simply lays down how those rights
relate to people with disabilities.
TA next explained ‘the principle of progressivity’. This means that when
countries have ratified the Convention, many of its provisions may be introduced
over an extended period of time. This applies to economiccultural and social
rights. Other rights, such as non-discrimination, come into effect immediately
on ratification. However it is not always clear on the face of it which rights
fall into which category.
Ta went on to note other unclarified matters in the convention. E.g. words and
phrasing vary between the permissive one and the mandatory. it may be said that
there is a lot of ‘soft’ language, eg ‘encourage’, ‘promote’ so that it is not
always clear what governments must do.
Out of 128 countries, 83 have signed the convention so far. Rather fewer have
signed the ‘optional protocol’, which allows referral to UN adjudicatory body if
all national remedies fail. The EU has signed the protocol and this will affect
member states depending on competency. This could impact on some employment
issues It is hoped that bodies like EDF will come to understand competency
issues and so be able to campaign on them along with the EU.
when a country has signed the convention, the next stage is ratification. States
require time to integrate the convention into national law. States with a
written constitution will be able to pass the convention into law more easily
than those without one.
The UK is currently studying the effect that ratification of the Convention will
have on its national law Another problem arises from the need for Translation If
the language of a country is not an official language of the UN that country is
responsible for translation of the convention. It is important for disability
organisations to carefully check their governments' official translation for
accuracy.
The Convention has things to say about its own implementation: it is Very
important that people with disabilities are involved. It is important that
groups like blind and ps people should not rely on national forums of disabled
people. Some of the convention articles are particularly important to particular
groups of disabled people, others are important to all disabled people . some
articles are of special relevance to blind and partially sighted people ., and
yet others to blind people specifically.
TA then turned to the draft analysis being undertaken by EBU which he was in
process of preparing. The Commission on the Rights of Blind and Partially
Sighted People had identified issues important to blind people by working
through the convention text paragraph by paragraph. It is hoped that the results
will eventually appear on the EBU website as part of a database, which will
enable EBU members to identify national differences in the way the Convention is
being implemented . The EBU initial analysis should be completed in time for
discussion at the EBU General assembly in October.
FR asked about the adjudication. TA indicated that the UN will set up a
committee of experts, some of whom will be people with disabilities in the
autumn to receive reports from the countries on implementation. It will be able
to hear individual cases only if the country has signed the Optional protocol.
The UK has not signed it.
Before listing the Articles specific to blind and ps people, TA noted that the
convention contained no definition of disability. However, article 1 lists the
kind of people whom the convention is intended to benefit. It works with the
social model of disability. It covers blind and ps people by its inclusion of
‘sensory impairment’.
Article 9, accessibility, requires appropriate steps to be taken to provide
access to the built environment, transport, information technology, etc. It
mentions braille signage and acknowledges the need for training. This is a
helpful article, but subject to ‘the ‘principle of progressivity’.
Article 11, People at special risk in emergencies. ‘Emergency’ relates eg to
armed conflict.
Article 12, Equality and recognition before the law. This Includes the right to
own property and handle financial affairs .
Article 13, Access to justice. This refers to effective participation in legal
proceedings Article 16, Freedom from exploitation and violence. Relates to
protection from exploitation, violence and abuse, important to us because of the
vulnerability of blind and partially sighted women and girls
Article 20, Personal mobility. This again acknowledges the need for Training,
and facilitating access to mobility equipment .
Article 21, Freedom of expression and access to information.
this recognises the right of people t communicate I formats of their choice and
access to information in the public domain.
Article 23, Health. TA said there was an issue here about health information.
Results should be individually accessible in order to maintain Confidentiality.
Article 24, Education. Education should be ‘inclusive’ This is an ‘underpinning
principle’. There had been A fight to keep specialist provision. The safeguard
is in sub-paragraph 3c, which states clearly that blind or deaf should have
access to instruction in appropriate media, i.e. braille, sign language, etc. A
further safeguard is that the educational environment should be such as to
maximise the social and academic potential of the student. This should be enough
to protect special provision or support. Also it is required that governments
provide primary and secondary education.
Article 26, rehabilitation. governments are to 'take effective measures' to
provide this. Article 27, work, employment and occupation.
Article, 28, adequate standard of living and social protection. Refers to access
to people in poverty to assistance with disability related costs this should
include equipment and personal support for blind and ps people.
ARTICLE 29, Participation in Political and Public Life
This is important to blind and partially sighted people, as it includes requires
governments to ensure secret voting and the provision of accessible voting
materials.
Article 30 Participation in cultural life, recreation and sport
governments are required to take appropriate steps to provide access to cultural
materials, cinema, and TV.
TA explained that EBU aims to establish ‘needs and characteristics’ of blind and
ps people and then ask how a particular article relates to these.
With regard to employment the needs and characteristics of blind people are:
(i) They can work successfully in a range of jobs providing effective supports
are provided.
ii) employers' perceptions are that blind and ps people are difficult to employ.
There is a need to disseminate knowledge of the occupations which blind people
do.
(iii) The proportion of blind and ps people in colleges, universities and
courses of training is lower than for the population as a whole, partly due to
lack of self-esteem or confidence, and encouragement must be provided.
(iv) Blind and ps people need vocational training and placement services staffed
by professional trainers, who must have the necessary facilities.
(v) There is a perceived relationship between statutory income and low paid work
which can be a disincentive to employment.
(vi) Job retention is important for those who lose sight while in employment.
Support must be provided for them.
(vii) Many blind and ps people have other disabilities which lead to a need for
sheltered/ supported employment.
(viii) The nature of work is changing, so research is needed if blind and ps
people are to be in a position to switch from occupations traditionally open to
them to new ones.
(ix) The principle of universal design should be applied to the production of
equipment used in employment.
These are the ‘needs and characteristics’ of blind and ps people. How does the
convention measure up to them?
Article 27 acknowledges that disabled people have the right to work on the same
basis as other people.
it requires governments to take steps inter alia to:
(a) Prohibit discrimination regarding disability in the work place. note the
strong word ‘prohibition.
(b) Protect the right to equal opportunity to work, and to equality of
remuneration for the same work.
(c) Protect The right to join trade unions.
These are the general provisions. The remainder to be discussed relate to issues
that arise from disability
(d) Enable access to vocational training, placement services etc. EBU comment:
vocational training, rehabilitation, placement etc. must be staffed by
professional trainers with the necessary facilities. Governments should fund
this, including income support, cost of equipment, readers, adaptations to work
place, costs of travel. There should be induction training for people starting
jobs or attaining promotion.
(e) Promote opportunities for career advancement. Governments should promote
employment of blind and ps people in mainstream and supported employment.
FR suggested there might be a comment on the value of voluntary action to
support blind and ps people. He had in mind encouragement of mutual self-help
groups of blind and ps people and the organisation of voluntary groups of
sighted readers to assist with job-related reading outside working hours. RC
wondered if this conflicted with a rights based approach. .
FR thought it was complementary. He instanced examples of such activities that
were supported by local authorities to the significant benefit of blind and ps
people. It was the view of members present that voluntary action should be
delivered in a ‘professional’ not an ‘amateurish’ way.
(f) More blind and ps people should be employed by public bodies.
(g) Governments should promote self-employment in business.
(h) And should Promote employment of blind and ps people in the private sector
with policies and measures which may include affirmative action programmes,
incentives and other measures. . It is the view of EBU that Governments should
make provision, with funding, for supported employment which can help blind and
ps people find and retain jobs. Sheltered/ supported employment should be
provided for blind and ps people with additional disabilities. Governments
should fund continuing research to develop new employment opportunities
(i) It is very important to Ensure that ‘reasonable accommodation’ is provided
in the work place. There should be state funding for assistive equipment,
personal assistance, and transport for blind and ps people in open and supported
employment.
(j) Governments should promote work experience for blind and ps people in the
open labour market.
(k) And promote vocational training and professional rehabilitation for people
losing their sight in employment, so as to enable job retention. EBU considers
that this is ‘soft’ provision unless employers are required to provide leave of
absence to pursue rehabilitation, or vocational training. Leave should be
granted with an option to return to the job or a similar one. Governments should
ensure that such courses meet the needs of blind and ps people.
Finally, TA noted that Article 27 para 2. seeks to ensure that blind people are
not held in slavery or servitude and are protected from forced or compulsory
labour. He considered that such cases were unlikely to occur in the EU.
The chairman thanked TA for his thorough analysis and asked What he considered
the impact of the UN Convention would be in the EU. Ta thought it was hard to
say. Probably there will be ‘a spectrum of impacts’. In most countries it is
likely to have marginal impact because governments will say they are already
doing what the CONVENTION requires. Uk is already saying this except for job
retention. the picture may be different in the new accession countries. Yet even
there the impact could be slowed down by the ‘principle of progressivity’.
Nevertheless the Convention could still be a tool for campaigning. It is very
important that EBU gets involved in monitoring the implementation. There must be
action plans measuring progress.
RC commented that some countries in the EU were not even compliant with the EES
directive. Germany has been brought before the courts. This suggests that The UN
Convention could be valuable in countries where rights are restricted or denied,
but only if there were political will. In Italy, for example, a law cannot be
applied if the relevant ministry does not issue it. What, asked RC, can this
meeting recommend to EBU. AGREED to recommend EBU to disseminate as widely as
possible information about the UN Convention and make members aware of the
‘rights based approach.
The chairman asked those who had been present to say What were the most
important outcomes and What were the core issues considered.
CN, who organised the conference on behalf of the Pan-Cyprus Association of the
Blind, undertook to produce a complete report after he had had an opportunity to
consult his notes. Meantime he thought it worth highlighting the following:
About 28 countries were represented, not all from Europe.
The speakers ranged widely in subject matter.
As to the core issues there had been an important debate around the question of
how many blind and ps people were ‘job ready’. New evidence in the Uk report,
Network 1000 seemed to suggest that in countries like the UK the number might be
as low as 5000.
CN said some of the papers had given rise to reflections on the education given
to blind students in mainstream schools. Some had questioned whether these
pupils were prepared for independent mobility and other challenges.
there had also been an interesting paper from Croatia on the quota system.
ACTION CN to produce a short report as above
The chairman asked the group if they could produce three questions for the
questionnaire. The following three questions were accepted after discussion:
1 What have been the positive results in your country of the EU directive on
employment?
2 Please describe how the system of sheltered employment affects blind and ps
people in your country.
3 What incentives does your country have to encourage employment of blind and ps
people, e.g. quota system, reserved occupations, legal requirement on employers
to make reasonable accommodation?
Item 2 Chairman to circulate EDF paper on state aid for sheltered workshops.
3 WELFARE BENEFITS AS DISINCENTIVE TO WORK. RC to report this discussion to EBU
with a view to proceeding by the following steps:
(i) collect and circulate the three reports concerning UK, Lithuania and the
CZEK Republic;
(ii) include a question on this subject in the forthcoming EBU questionnaire.
(iii) EBU Board may then consider whether professional research would be needed.
4 EDF QUESTIONNAIRE ON STATE AID.FR should amend it along the lines of the
briefing paper which EBU submitted to the Employment and Social Directorate in
March, 2007, so as to cover the points made in the above discussion.
6 OUTCOMES OF THE CYPRUS CONFERENCE 10-11 November 2006. CN to produce a short
report as above.
Why work? AGREED that this discussion could not be take further by this meeting.
Further advance would require a resolution of the EBU General Assembly.
AGREED that the whole discussion under item 3 had been very valuable for raising
a number of issues of concern to EBU. These were summarised as follows:
(i) right to work means Right to compete on equal terms with non-disabled
people.
2 Benefits should not be structured in such a way as to act as barriers to work
3 Disability compensation benefits should never be reduced when a person with
disabilities takes employment.
4 There should be no compulsion to enter upon paid employment..
5 Employment should be clearly recognised as one important means to inclusion.
6 The right to work must be implemented by action on the four levels identified
in the discussion. EBU should concentrate on influencing EU Commission and its
own members.
8 There should be state funding for equipment and personal support at the work
place.
9 EU Commission should stimulate collection of all necessary data to promote the
employment of blind and ps people.
4,1 AGREED that sheltered workshops should not be closed before considering
their reform.
AGREED to use the Rnib response as a basis for the EBU response to the EDF
questionnaire.
AGREED to record the following points of agreement:
1 In promoting employment opportunities for blind and ps people, special
provision and mainstreaming are complementary approaches.
2. The closure of sheltered workshops before full consideration has been given
to their possible reform as centres for supported employment should be resisted.
3 There is need to encourage as much experiment as possible in the provision of
special programmes for promoting supported mainstream employment for blind and
ps people who need it.
4 In furthering points 1-3 above, the principle of ‘reasonable accommodation’
should always be borne in mind.
5 So should the need for flexibility of provision to meet local circumstances.
4,2 At the invitation of the chairman, the meeting turned to examination of the
specific questions in the EDF questionnaire. The following approaches were
agreed:
Question 1: Follow RNIB response.
Throughout, do not stress the Uk specific programme, ‘Access to Work’, but
express its general principles.
On the question how costs are calculated we have no more information to provide.
AGREED that the expression ‘reduced productivity’ is stigmatising.
AGREED that while EBU may find functional assessment acceptable if it promoted
people into work, it should ‘resist the clinic’.
AGREED that any support supplied to a blind or ps person in employment should
continue as long as it was needed, i.e. there should be no time limitation of
state aid in this instance.
Finally, it was felt that employment protection law was a better way to deal
with the problem of the time limiting the sixty percent subsidy.
5 The UN Convention ON PROTECTING THE RIGHTS OF PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES.
AGREED to recommend EBU to disseminate as widely as possible information about
the UN Convention and make members aware of the ‘rights based approach’.
Fred Reid
22 May 2007