Solicitud directa (CEACR) - Adopción: 2016, Publicación: 106ª reunión CIT (2017)

Convenio sobre la readaptación profesional y el empleo (personas inválidas), 1983 (núm. 159) - Alemania (Ratificación : 1989)

Articles 1–7 of the Convention. National policy and implementing measures. The Committee notes the detailed information provided in the Government’s report, including statistical information, and its response to the Committee’s comments as well as to the observations made by the German Confederation of Trade Unions (DGB) in September 2015. The Committee understands that, under national legislation, the degree of an individual’s disability is measured on a scale from 1 to 100 per cent. An individual found to have a functional impairment of at least 50 per cent is considered as severely disabled. The Government concurs with the DGB’s observation that unemployment rates for persons with severe disabilities have not followed the same pattern as the general unemployment trend. According to the December 2015 report of the Federal Employment Agency, while the unemployment rate for persons with severe disabilities dropped from 15.8 per cent in 2007 to 13.4 per cent in 2015, the unemployment rate for the rest of the population decreased from 11.5 per cent to 8.2 per cent during the same period. Thus, from 2007 to 2015, the gap between the unemployment rates of persons with severe disabilities and the remainder of the population has widened by 0.9 percentage points.

The Committee notes that employers with an average of at least 20 employees a year are required by law to have a workforce composed of at least 5 per cent of persons with severe disabilities. According to the December 2015 report of the Federal Employment Agency, in 2014, employers subject to the quota requirement had 1,014,071 persons with severe disabilities on their payroll (563,919 men and 450,152 women). While it does not replace an employer’s legal obligation, the levy system permits employers that do not employ the prescribed number of persons with disabilities to instead pay a staggered compensation, depending on the degree of the employer’s non-compliance with the required 5 per cent quota. The integration authorities use this compensation to fund professional rehabilitation measures as well as reasonable accommodations at the workplace. The Committee notes that the number of public and private employers subject to the quota requirement that do not employ any persons with severe disabilities decreased from 38.3 per cent in 2002 to 25.7 per cent in 2014. The percentage of persons with severe disabilities employed by all employers subject to the quota requirement increased from 4.3 per cent in 2008 to 4.7 per cent in 2014, falling short of the 5 per cent quota established by law. There remains a gap between private and public employers subjected to the quota scheme. While the workforce of private employers was made up of 4.1 per cent of workers with severe disabilities in 2014, the respective percentage for public employers was 6.6 per cent, exceeding the quota requirement.

The Government considers that despite the higher qualifications of persons with severe disabilities in comparison with persons with non-severe disabilities, awareness-raising among employers about the beneficial effects of employing persons with severe disabilities remains necessary, leading to the launch in 2013 of the “Inclusion Initiative for Education and Employment” together with the DGB, the Confederation of German Employers’ Associations, representatives of persons with disabilities and other institutions. Addressing employers directly, this initiative and others aims to highlight best practices and advise employers on inclusion measures as well as on concrete subsidies available for job creation under the “Inclusion Initiative II – AllInBusiness”. This complements the “Inclusion Initiative”, which will be continued in the area of provision of professional orientation for pupils. The Committee notes that in 2015 the German pension insurance started to extend its information service as regards the so-called interpretation management of companies under Social Code IX. The Committee further notes that these initiatives are part of the implementation of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities in which associations of persons with disabilities are involved and which is also open to other stakeholders, including the social partners. Further to the 2011 National Action Plan, the National Action Plan 2.0 was adopted in June 2016. It calls for 175 measures to be taken in 13 areas, including the development and implementation of legislation and sustainable employment policies and programmes. The Committee requests the Government to continue to provide information on the formulation and implementation of policies and measures to enable persons with disabilities, including those with severe disabilities, to access, advance and remain in employment, in both the public and private sectors, including vocational rehabilitation and training measures and statistics on the impact of such measures, disaggregated by sex. The Committee also requests the Government to provide information on policies and measures adopted or envisaged to promote employment opportunities for persons with intellectual and psychosocial disabilities. Please also provide information concerning the manner in which the social partners and representatives of organizations of persons with disabilities are consulted in relation to the development and implementation of policies and programmes to promote vocational guidance, rehabilitation and training and the employment of persons with disabilities.