Sheltered employment is a type of subsidised employment policy in special firms that serve as shelters for people with disabilities. Such firms receive subsidies and/or income transfers to pay the wages of people with disabilities, who usually make up the vast majority of their staff. Depending on the country and laws, the status of such firms ranges from ‘true’ firms (such as for-profit organisations) to workshops or occupational centres (such as not-for-profit organisations). Because of this variation in firm status, in this article, we use the general term ‘sheltered employment centre’ (SEC). Sheltered work and similar practices continue to be a common service for people with intellectual disabilities. Participants, on the other hand, are predominantly isolated and excluded from their wider communities as a result of being placed in institutions.
Various types of sheltered work should be provided for “disabled persons for whom access to open employment is not practical,” according to the International Labour Organization’s vocational rehabilitation and employment of disabled persons. A clear goal appears to be to limit sheltered employment to persons who are “unemployed” in regular businesses. This recommendation also supports “encouraging co-operation between sheltered and production workshops on organisational and management issues in order to improve the employment situation of their disabled workers and, where possible, to assist them in preparing for employment under normal conditions.” SECs frequently occupy a middle ground between non-market and protected market environments from this standpoint.
The role of mainstream public employment services:
In a changing world of work, where job losses and transitions are becoming more common throughout people’s working lives, and where unemployment rates have risen significantly in many countries as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, the PES is becoming increasingly important in national, regional, and local efforts to combat unemployment and support economic growth.
Persons with disabilities are one of the new populations addressed by the PES. A crucial labour market concern for policymakers today is ensuring that people with disabilities are assisted in reaching their career goals. When compared to those without impairments, people with disabilities face pervasive and persistent hurdles to employment, resulting in reduced labour force participation, fewer hours worked, and lower-income. Depending on the severity of the condition, when the disability was acquired (before or after starting work), and the sorts of benefits received, PES may provide support to persons with disabilities in a variety of ways and through a variety of channels. The role of PES has become even more important in light of the ongoing COVID-19 crisis. The pandemic has thrown the world into an economic crisis and put a large number of jobs at risk in both the short and long term.
Sheltered workshops are chosen for their reputation as exploitation hotspots. Their divisive tendency has long been noted, and it has sparked arguments in all areas of equality. This study concerns the legitimacy of sheltered labour in light of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities by linking the experience of segregation with the isolation and social disadvantages suffered by individuals with intellectual disabilities. This necessitated a discussion on how to adequately define intellectual disability equality.
The difficulty in claiming that sheltered workshop placements are discriminatory stems from their many and different definitions and aims, which are established by binary policy dimensions that might range from rights-based to protectionist. As a result, the frequently contradictory goals of protectionism on the one hand and autonomy on the other, which dominated the Convention’s writing, continue to shape the disability policy landscape today.