Australia’s Disability Employment Services Program: Participant Perspectives on Factors Influencing Access to Work

Alexandra Devine, Marissa Shields, Stefanie Dimov, Helen Dickinson, Cathy Vaughan, Rebecca Bentley, Anthony D. LaMontagne and Anne Kavanagh
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Alexandra Devine: Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, University of Melbourne, Melbourne 3010, Australia
Marissa Shields: Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, University of Melbourne, Melbourne 3010, Australia
Stefanie Dimov: Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, University of Melbourne, Melbourne 3010, Australia
Helen Dickinson: School of Business, University of New South Wales, Canberra 2610, Australia
Cathy Vaughan: Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, University of Melbourne, Melbourne 3010, Australia
Rebecca Bentley: Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, University of Melbourne, Melbourne 3010, Australia
Anthony D. LaMontagne: School of Health and Social Development, Deakin University, Melbourne 3125, Australia
Anne Kavanagh: Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, University of Melbourne, Melbourne 3010, Australia

IJERPH, 2021, vol. 18, issue 21, 1-20

Abstract: Disability employment programs play a key role in supporting people with disability to overcome barriers to finding and maintaining work. Despite significant investment, ongoing reforms to Australia’s Disability Employment Services (DES) are yet to lead to improved outcomes. This paper presents findings from the Improving Disability Employment Study (IDES): a two-wave survey of 197 DES participants that aims to understand their perspectives on factors that influence access to paid work. Analysis of employment status by type of barrier indicates many respondents experience multiple barriers across vocational (lack of qualifications), non-vocational (inaccessible transport) and structural (limited availability of jobs, insufficient resourcing) domains. The odds of gaining work decreased as the number of barriers across all domains increased with each unit of barrier reported (OR 1.22, 95% CI 1.07, 1.38). Unemployed respondents wanted more support from employment programs to navigate the welfare system and suggest suitable work, whereas employed respondents wanted support to maintain work, indicating the need to better tailor service provision according to the needs of job-seekers. Combined with our findings from the participant perspective, improving understanding of these relationships through in-depth analysis and reporting of DES program data would provide better evidence to support current DES reform and improve models of service delivery.

Keywords: disability employment programs; vocational; non-vocational and structural barriers to work; paid employment for people with disability (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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