The willingness of Macao companies to hire employees with disabilities remains low despite government initiatives geared towards increasing the group’s representation in the workplace, according to lawmaker Ho Ion Sang. He’s now pushing for more effective vocational training in the city, the Macau Daily Times reports.
In a recent submission to the government, Ho said that many employers were concerned whether people with disabilities could adapt to regular workplaces. These perceptions limited their opportunities to find work, he said.
To combat the issue, Ho wants to see improved vocational training courses and better career planning services for people with disabilities, including support with office integration.
[See more: International Day of Persons with Disabilities: the challenges faced in Macao]
According to the Times, he also called for the government to incentivise employers to offer internships and training programmes tailored to people with disabilities, fostering workplace cultures of inclusion.
Employers of people with disabilities are not obliged to pay them minimum wage and are also entitled to a government subsidy in the form of a tax rebate. However, Ho said that the rebate’s current application process was overly bureaucratic and said that improved inter-departmental cooperation was needed to streamline the system.
He added that initiatives, like the annual awards for outstanding employers of people with disabilities, co-organised by the Social Welfare Bureau and the Labour Affairs Bureau, didn’t appear to be achieving concrete results.
