Hi I am looking for everyone's option on a subject that is missed often by employers.The cost of implementing reasonable adjustments. Who should be paying for it and how much is too much?
To give you an example of what I am talking about here is a scenario of a real person who can't afford to go to work because the employers won't sponsor them to help them return to work. They are effectively "over qualified" to do there job, but still can't afford to go to work, because the employers deem them as less capable to do there job, because they have to use public transport to get about. Their disability means they will never be able to drive.
How do advocates for the disabled person persuade employers to use services like Access To Work that the government fund, or sponsor these BRITISH DISABLED PEOPLE! To help them get jobs? How do CIPD's like me persuade employers to buy into the British economy, if they are not going to buy into our own British people? How do I get employers to understand that sponsoring a disabled person who has a disability like being PARTIALLY SIGHTED OR HAS EPILEPSY may need support or might have Special Educational Needs (SEND), or SEND may support like a personal assistant to start a job. These services cost the user or employee and not the employer, shouldn't this change, when the employee gets paid not enough to pay for it!
Did you know a support dog needs £9000 for the training before you even start a job? Then there is all the kit. A SEND young person needs a Personal Assistant when starting a job, a bit like teaching Assistant, just until the have done there induction and are ready to start there job, some disabilities like Autism may need some additional support in the job.
Who should pay for this, and why is the cost passed on to the worker, when the worker is paid next to nothing to start with? Why are disabled workers left with hardly anything, when they end up paying for support, just so they have a job.
Do you think this should change, and I would like to here you ideas on this please, send me your ideas, planning to sent a petition to Parliament. We need 10,000 please.
Regards Niki
This is obviously a topic you feel very strongly about, however I have read through the post a couple of times to ensure I have understood the points you are seeking to make. My initial thoughts are:
1) What is reasonable depends largely on the individual employer. No two companies are the same and it is not reasonable for all companies to be forced to accept the same types of reasonable adjustments, a small organisation of 10 people will not have the ability same types of adjustments as we might expect of a company of lets say 1000.
2) Your concerns about travel to the workplace. I think you would be hard pushed to find any employer agree to pay for someone's travel costs regardless of their circumstances. What might be reasonable would be to look at whether or not the job can be done from an alternative location based on the nature of the job. If an individual is unable to drive due to their disability, then a reasonable adjustment may be to look at remote working if (and only if) the type of work can be done so or can be adjusted to be done remotely and if the impact of such an adjustment does not incur the employer additional costs that may or may not be reasonable depending on their size. If the work cannot be done elsewhere then another reasonable adjustment may be flexing the start and finish times of the role for the individual to support them with accessing public transport. Again it is not a one size fits all approach and depends on both the individual employee and the business. Some businesses do not have good access to public transport and it is not the businesses responsibility to ensure public transport access, this is far outside of their control.
3) Regarding employers reaching out to and working with access to work, this comes down to a lack of awareness in some cases. I have worked in organisations who didn't know Access to Work was even a thing. Arguably it still isn't promoted very well.
4) Your concerns about the affordability of support for employees with disabilities for support mechanisms such as support dogs, arguably this is again not something that would be reasonable to expect individual employers to pay for. Yes the costs of training specialist support dogs is high, however many individuals who need this kind of support are accessing this outside of the working environment through the excellent charities and support services who train these wonderful animals, the individual is rarely (as I understand it) expected to pay to train the dog themselves. If we're looking purely at pay then again, it is a sector based topic and based on the size of the business and what each business feels they can afford to pay their employees and is likely based on their experience, knowledge and skill set for the role they are performing. I would sincerely hope that no sensible employer is actively paying employees with disabilities less than able bodied employees in 2024. Regarding personal assistants, the key word here is personal. If the employer were to take on the cost of paying for this, then there may be the possibility of the assistant being considered an employee or worker of the organisation and the organisation will end up with the responsibilities and cost associated with this. Which would again not be a reasonable adjustment.
5) There is no doubt that things need to change in certain areas to ensure those with disabilities or special educational needs can access work as freely as able bodied or neuro-typical individuals but it is not a one size fits all topic. There are simply too many variables at play to force employers to meet the costs you mention above or even to pass those costs onto employers to enable individuals to access work. Largely the support needs to come from central government to provide better funding and support to individuals and employers. Local government needs to be involved as well with better career support at school level and post-education, too often job centers are not equipped to actually provide proper career support or guidance as well as having proper knowledge and understanding of different disabilities and the impact they have on individuals, being able to properly sign-post and refer people to charities and other organisations who specialise in providing support to individuals depending on the nature of their disability. Additionally local government need to look at improving public transport links to places where employers are based for example industrial estates - my previous place of work had a bus stop at the end of the road with no bus running to it, and the nearest train station a 45 minute walk away as an example of poor transport links.
This is no doubt a challenging topic that has many different things to consider within it and I apologise if I have interpreted your thoughts in correctly. However I hope you will find my thoughts useful.
Thank you Gemma for your reply, I am.trying to get peoples opinions on how they have dealt with this issue. I have worked for a few companies myself and found that some didnt use Access for Work, and others had there own procedures which were outdated. I am looking to see how other companies deal with transport issues for people, what there model is, and what lessons can be learnt.
Regards
Niki
Gemma has made some great practical suggestions here. I'd also suggest getting in touch with your local Work & Health or Pioneer provider - these are government-funded programmes that support individuals with health barriers to find work. Also try the "Disability Confident" scheme, which works with employers to help them understand how to help individuals with disabilities. It's also worth looking at charities specific to the disability as they will have experience in supporting people into work and know employers and adjustments that have been really effective - e.g. RNIB work with employers and programmes like those mentioned above, Autism+ support individuals with a range of SEN needs.
Also I would steer clear of referring to "British" workers if your aim is to support workers requiring reasonable adjustments. Workers of all nationalities may need adjustments and all can contribute to British economy. I'm sure I have misinterpreted but there are several references to "British" in your original post when referring to people and this could be read as alienating a proportion of other workers, in a way that may not be helpful to your goal.
Whenever I have used Access to work it's been up to the individual to apply for it anyway. We need our employees to drive as they need to go to various locations with equipment, so wouldn't be able to use public transport. No reasonable adjustment would solve this.
