Mr. Gerard Brady:

We had a big project on this two years ago with some of the disability groups and NGOs in that space. We looked at how we could bring more people with disabilities into the workforce. We had a challenge three or four years ago or more with regard to female participation in the labour force but there has been a remarkable increase in that regard. For people with disabilities, from an employer perspective, there are lots of other supports that we have put in place but more guidance for employers and more engagement is needed. The wage subsidy scheme for employers to employ people with disabilities has probably not kept up with where wages have gone in the last number of years. Improvements have been made to that recently but it could go further in linking it to the living wage, as that is introduced over the next few years. In general, the big challenge is to make sure that the supports are in place for the person with disabilities coming into the workplace. Some of those supports are in place, if people are going into, for example, some State schemes. However, if they go to private employment, they do not have the same support.