FOR all the rapid gains some people with disabilities are making in certain areas of Jamaican society, when it comes to finding employment, most are still at a disadvantage.

COKE-LLOYD. JEF to partner with HEART next year on jobs for disabled issue

"The majority of them are unable to find gainful employment," Monica Bartley, the chairperson of the Combined Disabilities Association, said in a 2001 report prepared for the International Disability Rights Monitor (IDRM) on how persons with disabilities are treated in Jamaica.

The factors listed by Bartley as prohibiting their inclusion in the workforce included: discrimination; negative attitude of employers towards disability; inaccessible workplaces; low levels of experience and training available to most people with disabilities and socio-economic conditions.

Monica Woods, executive director of the Jamaica Society for the Blind, pointed out that most of the blind persons who work were employed by the government. Even though many blind persons were not qualified, many of those who had received training at the tertiary level still found it difficult to get employment, she complained.

"There are many blind persons who are not yet qualified. But there are blind persons who have left tertiary institutions who are social workers. Some of them get employment but it's mostly done by government," Woods said.

Many blind persons had secretarial skills or could be telephone operators but "again, only the government employs these people," she emphasised. "I know it's a very competitive market but sometimes they are interviewed for jobs they can do but they are turned down because of their disability," said Woods.

Jamaica Employers' Federation (JEF) executive director Jacqueline Coke-Lloyd said that her organisation, which represents the International Labour Organisation (ILO), has been looking at various strategies for dealing with the problem.

"We are certainly against discrimination. As a matter of fact, we encourage our members and employers to employ the disabled," Coke-Lloyd said. A number of companies do employ disabled persons, she noted.

In 2005, the JEF will be working with the HEART Trust/NTA on the issue, she said. "We are certainly going to partner with HEART in the new year, to look at various competencies and what it is that the challenged person is able to do, and certainly route them in those area so that employers are able to employ them in short order," Coke-Lloyd told the Sunday Observer.

The JEF executive director said that Jamaica, as a country, needed to look at, and determine, what persons with a specific disability could do. Employing persons with disabilities was a complex issue, she said.

"You're talking about making adjustments in buildings and a number of things in order to accommodate disabled persons... The curriculum needs to be looked at, the way we teach, transportation, all our systems," Coke-Lloyd said.

She said that the JEF and blind Senator Floyd Morris, the minister of state in the Labour and Social Security Ministry, had been discussing how persons with disabilities and employers could benefit from a partnership.

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