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Working for a change? The same as you?
Principles
It is important to set out the key principles that guide our work in this report.
1.
No one who wants to work is unemployable, whatever his or her disability.
2.
We can only ensure fair employment for people with a learning disability through a 'mainstreaming' approach. Inclusive employment must be seen as a mainstream part of normal employment and enterprise in Scotland. Specialist agencies play a vital role in complementing and supporting - but not replacing - the contribution of employers, work teams, the role of Jobcentre Plus and the contributions of people with a learning disability themselves.
3.
Political leadership at a national level needs to enable professionals working with people with learning disabilities to follow the successful Norwegian principle of 'employment first'. Norway's approach is based on the welfare principle that every person has the right to participate in work, and work should be encouraged for everyone whatever his or her disability, diagnosis or label, before benefits are considered (Evans, 1999). This means that 'employment thinking' supersedes 'day centre thinking', 'training thinking', 'special college thinking' and so on. Glasgow Learning Disability Partnership is already officially committed 'to identifying and securing employment for people with learning disabilities in the City as the first choice in developing meaningful employment opportunities' (GLDP, 2003).
4. For a society engaging in equal opportunities for all,
achieving mainstream employment of people with learning disabilities is in principle the right thing to do - whether it is a financially cheap thing to do or financially expensive thing to do.
5.
The social and institutional invisibility of learning disability needs to end.
6.
The stereotyping of people with learning disabilities needs to end and be replaced with a person-centred view.
7.
The leadership required to lever the changes expressed above needs, above all, to keep hold of the mainstreaming vision, taking Scotland from making the best of the current system to changing institutionalised inequalities.
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