Employment: Coronavirus
(asked on 22nd July 2020) - View Source
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what plans her Department has to monitor the effect of the ending of the shielding programme on levels of employment among disabled and vulnerable people.
We are monitoring the employment of a number of groups, including disabled people, using the quarterly Labour Force Survey along with other relevant sources throughout the pandemic. There will however be a lag until the data needed to fully assess any effects of easing lockdown restrictions on disabled and vulnerable people’s employment becomes available. We do know from Opinions and Lifestyle Survey * that lower proportions of disabled people report that COVID-19 has affected their job in comparison to non-disabled respondents (27.1% vs 50.2%). This may reflect a lower proportion of disabled people are in work. We will continue to monitor these issues alongside the wider labour market experiences of both disabled and vulnerable people.
When out of work, we know that disabled people tend to find it more difficult to get jobs. That is why we are actively working on policies to prevent ill-health related job losses, and to provide specific employment support for disabled people both in and out of work.