The Scottish Parliament is to recognise UNISON’s Year of Disabled Workers 2022 campaign with a members debate, sponsored by Pam Duncan-Glancy MSP, in the Scottish Parliament today (Thursday)
Pam Duncan-Glancy MSP has been a strong supporter since she launched the Scottish campaign at the beginning of 2022.
The campaign highlighted the experience of UNISON’s disabled members, the value disabled people bring to unions and workplaces, and to call for better enforcement of legal rights for disabled people – including the right to reasonable adjustments at work.
The campaign also highlighted that disabled people continue to face disadvantage, evidenced in the education, employment and pay gaps that persist in Scotland. It called for all employers to sign up to the Disability Employment Charter”
The campaign concept was developed in Scotland and was rolled out as a national campaign by UNISON, the campaign was supported by the wider trade union movement.
Secretary of UNISON Scotland’s Disabled Workers Committee, Alison Mitchell said: “It would be hard to conceive of anyone achieving more that we have in UNISON Scotland, and I want to thank everyone in UNISON and beyond who has supported our work throughout the year. We have over 200,000 disabled members across the UK and this whole experience reinforces that UNISON is the union for disabled workers.
But we still have so much more to do. Disabled people are less likely to be in employment, education, or training. They are more likely to have low – or no – qualifications, more likely to work part-time or be unemployed and they continue to face additional barriers to work. We will keep the momentum from this campaign to further improve the lives of disabled people and a main part of our campaigning into 2023 will be to press employers to sign up to the Disability Employment Charter”
Notes
UNISON is the largest union in Scotland. It represents members in local government, health, education, social care, police staff, community and voluntary sector,utilities and energy.
Members Business on Thursday 15th December 2022 is a debate sponsored by Pam Duncan Glancy about the UNISON’s ‘Year of the Disabled Worker’ Campaign 2022.