The below Parliamentary question was asked by Danny Kinahan on 2016-09-02.
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps he is taking to improve the life chances of people with disabilities.
Penny Mordaunt
The Government is committed to improving the life chances of disabled people and has made a commitment to halve the employment gap between disabled and non-disabled people.
The Government is working with employers through Disability Confident to challenge attitudes towards disability and ensure that disabled people have the opportunities to fulfil their potential and realise their aspirations. Since 2013 the number of disabled people in work has increased by almost half a million (493,000). Nearly 3.4 million disabled people are now in employment.
Access to Work provides practical and financial support with the additional costs faced by individuals whose heath or disability affects the way they do their job. 36,470 individuals were helped by Access to Work in the 2015/16 including record numbers of people with learning disabilities, mental health conditions and young people. Last year’s Spending review announced a real-terms increase in funding for access to work starting in 16/17 to enable the scheme to help a further 25,000 people by the end of the parliament.
Work Choice is a voluntary contracted specialist disability employment programme introduced in 2010 and helps people with disabilities whose needs cannot be met through other employment programmes, Access to Work or workplace adjustments. It provides individually tailored support (e.g. job search skills, basic training, and work placements) for disabled people who face the most complex employment barriers to find and stay in work.
Later this year, we will produce a Green Paper exploring a range of options to close the disability employment gap and transform the lives and prospects of disabled people, and conduct a consultation which will reach out to disabled people and their representative organisations.
