A motion was passed at UNISON’s local government conference to encourage all local authorities to adopt the disability employment charter and to introduce a statutory two-week time limit for employers to respond to requests for reasonable adjustments.
With one in ten adults in Britain receiving disability benefits and the Westminster government committed to getting two million people ‘back into work’, the need for reasonable adjustments for disabled people has never been greater.
Yet 30 years on from Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) 1995, disabled workers are still struggling to secure the reasonable adjustments at work that they are legally entitled to receive.
UNISON’s 2023 equality survey found that disabled members still struggle to get the adjustments they need. In local government, 39% of disabled members were refused some or all of the adjustments they asked for and, shockingly, another 11% didn’t even receive a response to their request.
When reasonable adjustments were agreed, disabled members in local government reported long waits before they were put in place. A quarter of reasonable adjustments (26%) took up to six months, 12% over six months and 8% of disabled members had to wait for over a year to receive the support they needed.
UNISON is a founding member of the disability employment charter. Workplace adjustments the charter calls for include:
- the right to request flexible working from day one of a job
- the right to paid disability leave for assessment, rehabilitation and training
- an increase in statutory sick pay to the European average
- a statutory right to facility time for trade union equality and disability reps.
Tracey Lancashire, speaking in support of the motion, said: “When reasonable adjustments aren’t made, disabled workers are much more likely to put on a capability assessment or disciplinary. Also the distress it can cause some disabled workers, particularly those who are neurodiverse, when asked about seriously intimate issues, can be very detrimental to their health.
“Reasonable adjustments aren’t just something that is nice to have. They are essential to the health and wellbeing of disabled members. Without them, disabled members can miss out on training, development and promotion opportunities, be put through difficult sickness absence hearings, targeted for redundancy, forced to reduce hours or even leave their jobs altogether.”
Another delegate added: “With the current slashes being made to PIP (Personal Independence Payments), there are going to be many more disabled people in the workplace. The Disability Employment Charter will be a necessary tool to support disabled workers.”
