Disability employment stream key focus of jobs summit

Helping Australians with a disability find work will be a key focus of the September jobs summit, with Social Services Minister Amanda Rishworth to host a roundtable this month.

Social Services Minister Amanda Rishworth. Picture Dean Martin/Advertiser

Helping Australians with a disability find work will be a key focus of the September jobs summit, with Social Services Minister Amanda Rishworth to host a roundtable on the issue later this month.

Ms Rishworth will be responsible for a disability employment stream at the jobs summit and, on Monday, will release a consultation report for the new disability employment services model.

The new model will replace the existing system which is scheduled to end in the middle of next year, with young people with disabilities still significantly more likely to be unemployed or underemployed.

About 52,000 working-aged people with disability who are not in the labour force intend to work or look for work, while 93 per cent of unemployed people aged 15-64 with disability experience difficulties in finding employment.

The unemployment rate for people with a disability at 10 per cent is also more than double that of working age people without a disability. Just 53.4 per cent of people with a disability are in the labour force, compared with 84.1 per cent of those without disability — a gap of over 30 per cent.

Ms Rishworth said that she wanted more businesses to hire people with disabilities, and it was wrong to view this as a “charitable act”.

She said that through her experience as the local member for the seat of Kingston in South Australia and as a clinical psychologist she was “aware of issues people with disability face in gaining employment”.

“The disability employment roundtable, which I will convene later this month, will be a foundational part of our plan to improve employment outcomes for people with disability,” she said. “We want to work with people with disability, their families, carers and others to ensure that disability employment policies and programs are well targeted.

“Hiring someone with disability should not be seen as an optional or charitable act. People with disability bring diverse skills and experiences and make significant contributions to the workplace.

“There is an amazing, skilled workforce that is sadly under-utilised. Hiring a person with disability makes good business sense and is good for the nation.”

The consultation process on the new disability employment model was chaired by Disability Discrimination Commissioner Ben Gauntlett and included disability representative organisations, employers, service provider peak bodies and ­academics.

It provided feedback to government on how to provide better access to employment support for those with disabilities, clearer information, greater program flexibility and more targeted support.

There were also different views on whether mutual obligations should be retained, with some calling for the removal of the suspension of payments when a person failed to meet their ­obligations.

Some participants in the consultation process urged the government to count volunteering, work experience and short courses as meeting mutual obligations for a six-month period to help jobseekers gain confidence and connect with employers.

The government was also advised to tweak the entry assessment for the system to ensure a focus on what an individual could do rather than what they could not. Currently, participants in the system are reassessed after 78 weeks, with some arguing the process should be removed entirely or conducted in “response to life events” or “as needed.”

Service providers said there was a need to focus on skills training, or job-specific training, to prepare people with disability for work, including young people without prior work experience.