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Wage employment: a viable option

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Access to wage employment should always be considered as an option for people with disabilities looking for work. It is important to remember, though, that people with disabilities should be considered for employment because of their skills and what they can bring to a job, not out of charitable concern. Supporting people with disabilities to obtain education and comprehensive skills training is important.

Learn about a disabled people’s organization that is working to facilitate hiring of people with disabilities in Lebanon.

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The Lebanese Physically Handicapped Union (LPHU) sees employment as its chief responsibility on behalf of people with disabilities in Lebanon, where the formal sector of the economy is strong and wage employment is the best option for people with disabilities. Its director says: “We all have different needs, but we have the same rights”.

LPHU’s employability projects aim to achieve three main outcomes:

  1. A change in attitude of the private sector, with employers regarding people with disabilities as potential employees who have productive capacity and purchasing power. (An important indicator is the percentage rise in employment of people with disabilities in private enterprises.)
  2. An increase in the capacities of people with disabilities (e.g. by increasing the access of persons with disabilities to mainstream vocational and technical training programmes that are adapted to meet the needs and situations of people with disabilities as well as the realities of the labour market)
  3. A change in government policies and practices by:
    • Government agencies effectively implementing the law on disability rights
    • National policies shifting from an exclusionary charity-based approach to one that is inclusive
    • National employment offices becoming better equipped to work with people with disabilities to assist them in finding employment

To achieve these outcomes, LPHU:

  • Researches where people with disabilities are employed and in what circumstances
  • Builds relationships with potential employers
  • Arranges training of people with disabilities to match the skills demanded by employers

LPHU has established employment advice centres for people with disabilities. The task of these centres is to get in touch with employers to determine what skills they are looking for and then assist people with disabilities to acquire the necessary skills.

LPHU also has a website for jobseekers with disabilities, which aims to match job seekers with job opportunities.

Tony, a client of an LPHU employment advice centre who has a job renovating films in a film archive, says: “LPHU has been very important to me. They have contacts in many businesses and it was through these contacts that they found me this job, which is creative and interesting.”

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