§ Mr. CrausbyTo ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what percentage of the total workforce in his Department is registered as disabled; and what steps he is taking to encourage the employment of disabled people in his Department. [102051]
§ Miss Melanie JohnsonThe old system of registration of disabled people ended when the employment provisions of the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 came into force on 2 December 1996. People who were registered as disabled on that date were given protection under the Act for a further three years, and into the future if they continued to meet the definition of disability contained in the Act. So employers, including the Chancellor's Departments now need to identify staff who might be covered by the employment provisions of the Act, rather than whether or not they were formerly registered as disabled. Current records show that about 4 per cent. of staff in the Treasury and Customs and 3.9 per cent. of staff in Inland Revenue have a disability as defined in the Act.
Each Department has a variety of measures in place to ensure equal treatment for disabled people, and to ensure that they meet their legal obligations to protect disabled people from discrimination in the field of employment.