Council Recommendation
of 24 July 1986 on the Employment of Disabled People in the Community (86/379/EEC)
THE COUNCIL OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES,
Having regard to the Treaty establishing the European Economic Community, and in
particular Article 235 thereof,
Having regard to the draft recommendation submitted by the Commission,
Having regard to the opinion of the European Parliament,
Having regard to the opinion of the Economic and Social Committee,
Whereas the Council Resolution of 21 January 1974 concerning a social action
programme provides for, inter alia, the implementation of a programme for
the vocational and social integration of handicapped persons;
Whereas the Council Resolution of 27 June 1974 established the initial
Community action programme for the vocational rehabilitation of handicapped
persons;
Whereas the Resolution of the Council and of the Representatives of the
Governments of the Member States, meeting within the Council, of 21 December
1981 on the social integration of handicapped people invites Member States
to ensure that handicapped people do not shoulder an unfair burden of the
effects, in particular from the point of view of employment, of economic
difficulties and to promote measures to prepare handicapped people for an active
life, but does not provide for a concerted or concentrated Community effort in
this regard;
Whereas, for the purpose of this Recommendation, 'disabled people' includes all
people with serious disabilities which result from physical, mental or
psychological impairments;
Whereas disabled people have the same right as all other workers to equal
opportunity in traing and employment;
Whereas, in a period of economic crisis, action at European and Community levels
should be not only continued but also intensified in order to promote the
achievement of equal opportunity by means of positive and coherent policies;
Whereas these policies should take account of the aspirations of disabled people
for a fully active and independent life;
Whereas the European Parliament, in its resolution of 11 March 1981,
stressed the need to promote at Community level the economic, social and
vocational integration of disabled people;
Whereas the provision of fair opportunities for disabled people in the field of
employment and vocational training appears necessary for the achievement of one
of the objectives of the Community; whereas the Treaty has not provided for the
powers of action required for the adoption of this Recommendation, other than
those of Article 235,
I. HEREBY RECOMMENDS MEMBER STATES:
To take all appropriate measures to promote fair opportunities for disabled
people in the field of employment and vocational training, including initial
training and employment as well as rehabilitation and resettlement.
The principle of fair opportunity for disabled people should be applied in
respect of:
access to employment and vocational training, whether normal or special,
including guidance, placement and follow-up services;
retention in that employment or vocational training and protection from
unfair dismissal;
opportunities for promotion and in-service training.
To this end, to continue and, if necessary, intensify and re-examine their
policies to help disabled people, where appropriate after consulting disabled
people's organizations and both sides of industry; such policies should take
account of measures and specific activities implemented in the other Member
States which have proved effective and worthwhile.
These policies should provide in particular for:
Elimination of negative discrimination by:
reviewing laws, regulations and administrative provisions to ensure that
they are not contrary to the principle of fair opportunity for disabled people;
taking appropriate measures to avoid as far as possible dismissals linked
to a disability;
limiting exceptions to the principle of equal treatment in access to
training or employment to the cases justified on the ground of a specific
incompatibility between a particular activity forming part of a job or course of
training and a particular disability; if necessary, it should be possible to
have this incompatibility confirmed by a medical certificate; any such exception
should be reviewed periodically in order to establish whether it continues to be
justified;
seeking to ensure that any tests required for access to vocational training
courses and any tests required during or at the end of such courses are designed
in such a way that candidates with disabilities are not thereby disadvantaged;
seeking to ensure that disabled people can go before the competent bodies to
establish their rights and can receive the necessary assistance to do so in
accordance with national law and practice.
Positive action for disabled people, including:
bearing in mind differences in sectors and enterprises, the fixing by Member
States, where appropriate and after consultation of disabled people's
organization and both sides of industry, of realistic percentage targets for the
employment of disabled people in public or private enterprises having a minimum
number of employees; such a minimum might be set at between 15 and 50. Measures
should also be adopted for making these targets public and achieving them;
the making available, in each Member State, of a guide or code of good
practice for the employment of disabled people, incorporating positive measures
already adopted in the Member State concerned and corresponding in spirit with
the provisions of this Recommendation; the Annex comprises a guideline framework
for such a guide or code, setting out examples of positive action; the guide or code of good practice should be circulated as widely as possible
and refer to the public and private sectors; it should describe clearly the contribution which the recipients of the guide or
code can and should make in putting into practice the national policy on
disabled people; it should include information and advice on the support that is
available from public services;
provision whereby the Member States encourage the public and private
enterprises to take all appropriate measures for the employment of disabled
people which correspond in spirit with the guide or code of good practice;
Member States should establish the means for making these policies, and the
annual progress made in their implementation, known to the public, according to
existing procedures for disseminating information in the social field;
provision whereby the employer and the rehabilitation services cooperate in
the resettlement, with the same enterprise as far as possible, of any employee
who becomes disabled.
To report to the Commission on the measures they have taken to implement this
Recommendation with a view to enabling the Commission to present the report
referred to in II.3.
II. INVITES THE COMMISSION:
To co-ordinate the exchange of information and experience on the
rehabilitation and employment of disabled people between national authorities;
agencies designated for the purpose by the Member States will also be involved
in this exchange.
To maintain appropriate aid from the European Social Fund to assist disabled
people of whatever age.
To report to the Council on the application of this Recommendation within two
years of its adoption.
Done at Brussels, 24 July 1986.
For the Council
The President
A. CLARK
ANNEX
Guideline framework for positive action to promote the employment and vocational
training of disabled people
Set out below are a number of possible measures, proposed by the Commission,
which Member States should consider in implementing this Recommendation and in
particular in drawing up a guide or code of good practice.
SECTION I: ASPECTS CONCERNING THE WORKING LIFE OF DISABLED PEOPLE
Job creation
Concerted projects
Ensuring that disabled people are given a full and fair opportunity to benefit
from projects such as regional development programmes, local employment
initiatives and action to promote the setting-up of cooperatives or of smaller
medium-sized enterprises.
New technology
Stimulating new employment opportunities by means of national initiatives both
in the new technology sector itself and in the use of new technologies as aids
to make employment possible in other fields.
In this connection, promoting projects to enable disabled people to take on tele-work.
Studying the specific risks to employment resulting from new technological
developments and taking appropriate action.
Adapting work stations to the needs of disabled people.
Other activities
Promoting and supporting projects which train and prepare disabled people to
create their own business or which identify new employment opportunities in the
media or in services on behalf of other disabled people.
Identifying other sectors (such as tertiary services, including tourism and
catering, agriculture or horticulture and forestry) which have good prospects
and are suitable for people with various disabilities.
Implementing schemes for creating new jobs for disabled people in these fields.
Drawing up special national policies for the re-employment of mentally
handicapped workers who lose their jobs because of changes in the character of
the employment market.
Creating more opportunities for part-time employment for disabled workers.
Sheltered employment
General
Reviewing the situation in each Member State in regard to sheltered employment
and sheltered occupation and drawing up plans for the future of this sector.
Quantitative side
Arranging that plans should assess future demand and the need to develop or
reduce such provision.
Qualitative side
Seeing that the review takes into consideration the following points:
improving the quality of less successful workshops or centres so that they
approximate to the best;
introducing new forms of activity (for example, in the computer sector) which
are both more interesting and likely to be more successful commercially;
increasing the amount of training available in workshops;
developing the transitional role of workshops, i.e. their function as
assessment and personal development centres coming between basic education or a
period of unemployment and entry to the open labour market;
reducing segregation by developing sheltered posts or groups within normal
enterprises, or mixed cooperatives.
Transition, vocational rehabilitation and
vocational training
Enabling disabled trainees to enrol in integrated training courses in normal
establishments wherever possible and desirable.
Giving a high priority to improving the availability and quality of vocational
preparation and training for disabled people, with particular regard to the
following aims:
giving equal consideration to the needs of workers who incur disability
through accident or disease and to the needs of young people whose disability is
congenital or was incurred in childhood or adolescence;
adapting the content of the training courses available to match more
realistically the needs of the labour market;
strengthening direct links between training establishments and local
representatives of both sides of industry;
improving training methods, in particular by developing the use of new
technologies as training aids and by introducing modular training and, where
appropriate, distant learning facilities;
encouraging experimentation in course structure and design so as to facilitate
the coordination of theoretical and practical training;
improving all aspects of access to training courses;
encouraging disabled trainees to take, as far as possible, a more active part
in planning their own training programmes;
guaranteeing continuity of vocational training and preparation for employment
by promoting interprofessional cooperation and creating multidisciplinary teams.
Guidance, assessment and placement
Guidance
Providing at regional level, as part of the general guidance services,
educational and vocational guidance services with a clear responsibility to meet
the needs of disabled people.
Providing, in the case of general, rather than specialized, guidance services,
for staff to be trained to understand and deal with the special needs of people
with disabilities.
Assessment
Identifying effective assessment methods and introducing those methods as far as
possible.
Giving priority to the principles that:
the disabled person himself (and, where appropriate, his family) should
participate actively in assessment;
every client should be encouraged to opt for the best level of training and
highest vocational goal of which he is capable.
Placement services
Setting up at regional level, as part of the general placement services,
placement services to help suitably trained disabled people to find a job.
Ensuring that these services also follow and support the disabled person in the
job, at least for an initial period.
Implementing training programmes for disabled people's placement officiers.
Employers and workers' organizations
Incentives to employers
Encouraging employers to make greater use of funds from public sources.
Where appropriate, making such funds available, in accordance with national
policies and situations, to cover, or contribute towards covering, the special
costs to an employer of taking on a disabled worker.
The eligible expenditure should include adaptations to machinery or equipment,
provision of access facilities and additional staff costs.
The grants should apply both when a worker is re-employed after incurring a
disability and for new recruitments.
In the case of new recruitments, envisaging a contribution from public funds to
the worker's salary over a given period of induction training.
Workers' organizations
Encouraging trade unions to give any necessary support to disabled workers and
to ensure that their interests are properly catered for in representative
structures.
Social security
Ensuring that disabled workers who lose their jobs or who cannot find employment
after vocational rehabilitation do not find themselves thereafter, purely
because of their disability, financially worse off than other workers in similar
circumstances.
Ensuring that benefit systems do not act as disincentives to part-time
employment, to trial periods of employment or to the gradual take-up of a job or
return to it, whenever any of these patterns is desirable from the disabled
worker's and employer's point of view.
SECTION II: GENERAL ASPECTS
The supporting environment
Ensuring that disabled people live in an environment which makes it possible for
them to benefit from further education and training and to make their full
contribution to the economy.
Effectively implementing existing legislation and where necessary introducing
new legislation to promote:
suitable housing (wherever possible integrated in the open community),
adequate transport to places of training and work,
access to and within the workplace, especially in the office sector.
Ensuring that measures aimed at guaranteeing fair opportunities for the disabled
are not regarded as discriminatory against the able-bodied.
Recognizing the need for flexibility in the conditions of employment of persons
looking after a disabled person.
Information and advice
Assistance for disabled people
Developing, for the benefit of disabled people, their families and the
professionals (whether case-workers or administrators) concerned, a system of
information and advice covering technical aids and other questions of importance
to disabled people.
Extending the system, which could consist of specialized centres or of services
developed in existing centres with wider functions, below the national level to
regional and local levels over time as resources permit.
Information campaign
Undertaking coordinated action to inform and advise politicians, both sides of
industry and the general public of the capacities and the needs of disabled
people.
In particular, making audio-visuel material on disability problems widely
available through appropriate channels such as interest groups and training
schemes run by both sides of industry.
Social research
Encouraging and coordinating social research - for which national data bases
should be established - both in order to analyse needs and possibilities and to
evaluate the effectiveness of measures undertaken.
Consultation, coordination and participation
Continuing and developing systems of national, regional and local authorities'
consultation, coordination and participation, including in this exercice the
public services and agencies, the voluntary organizations, independent
professionals, the two sides of industry and the media as well as disabled
people and their families.
Giving particular priority to the active involvement of disabled people, whether
in a representative or personal capacity, in the taking and implementation of
decisions concerning them.
