December 6 2004 - Canadians with disabilities have a right to
work and use their skills and knowledge to earn a living, says Marie Clarke
Walker, Executive Vice-President of the Canadian Labour Congress. She has urged the federal government to use the opportunity of its upcoming review
of Canada's labour laws to make the changes necessary to ensure equal and
productive participation of Canadians with disabilities in the workplace.
"The unemployment rates for workers with disabilities remain unacceptably
high, which is why so many people with disabilities live in poverty. It isn't
because there are no jobs available and certainly isn't because people with
disabilities can't do the jobs. It's because too many workplaces remain
inaccessible and too few see any reason to change," she says.
Clarke Walker says that the review of Canada's labour code provides a
chance to make the country's workplaces open and available to all workers with
the ability to get the job done, adding the duty to accommodate must go beyond
physical accessibility. She believes that workplace practices - ranging from hiring and promotion to
evaluation and individual accommodation (often costing very little,
in comparison to the value of the work itself) need to be brought into the 21st
century.
"It wasn't so long ago that women were denied work because employers
didn't want to build a different washroom or have to deal with pregnancy or
child care. Discrimination on the basis of mental or physical disability is no
less unconstitutional than discrimination on the basis of gender. There's no
place for this in Canada anymore," says Clarke Walker.
Sharon Hambleton, Canadian Labour Congress Vice-President representing
workers with disabilities, says that Canada's unions already make a difference in people's lives. She
argues that governments and employers should follow the unions' lead. The unions
launched a campaign three years ago to raise awareness of the barriers blocking
full participation as union members to persons with disabilities.
"Opportunities are opening up for workers with disabilities to
participate at all levels of union activity, which means issues of
accommodation and accessibility are finding their way to the bargaining table.
Workplaces are being changed for the better, but unions cannot do this by
themselves. Modernizing our labour code would certainly help," says Hambleton.