The amount of people with declared disabilities working for the Saskatchewan government has declined 27 per cent over the past five years.
A government response to a written question from equality and human rights critic David Forbes shows in the 2013-14 fiscal year, 333 people with disabilities worked for the government. That amount was 241 last year, a 92 person decline.
“In a period where there really hasn’t been much change in the public service commission, and we’re concerned they’re taking a disproportionate hit in terms of austerity,” Forbes said.
Forbes added that these written questions were driven by real-world concerns from public sector workers with disabilities.
The ministry with the most disabled employees is Justice at 53, followed closely by social services with 49. Executive Council has no disabled employees, and the health ministry has four.
The province does have a goal, set by the Saskatchewan Human Rights Commission, that 12.4 per cent of employees that fall under the Public Service Commissioner are people with disabilities.
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The same goal has been set for visible minorities.
Premier Scott Moe said the current employment rate is below that goal. According to the province, 241 employees with a disability represents 2.1 per cent of the workforce.
“We need to have a discussion as the government of Saskatchewan how we can do better on behalf of people across this province and their opportunities to participate in meaningful employment within the government,” Moe said.
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The premier added that he does not know why this employment stat has been trending downward. He also said discussions need to happen on employee retention and attracting people with disabilities.
Forbes would like to see the province take some kind of action to determine what caused this drop in disability employment.
“I think there should be an actionable goal, and what I mean by that is not just something that’s on paper,” Forbes said. “If positions are being lost I think in many ways they should be red circled and we really try to keep or maintain or grow the number of people working in each ministry that have a disability.”
The province plans to launch a new initiative this summer to ask government employees if they would like to self-declare a disability. Once this is complete, it will turn into an initiative asking employees to update their information annually.
Currently employees are only asked when they first apply for a government job.
The goal of this initiative is to get a more accurate picture of how many people with disabilities are working for the government’s various ministries. The Public Service Commission hopes this will also help provide a better picture of support needed.
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