Under section 8 of the Minimum Wage Act, disabled people can legally be paid below the minimum wage.
Many disabled workers are still paid far less than minimum wage, even as Aotearoa marks an international day of recognition for disabled people. Advocates are demanding change, reports Olivia Shivas.
Steve Drury cares for his employees – yet he’s only willing to pay them an average of $2.17 an hour.
Drury’s the general manager at AttainAble, a social enterprise business that runs a factory and community programme in Auckland’s East Tāmaki.
There, workers with learning disabilities pack, count and label products for contracted customers – their labour comes cheap, and Drury says his business model wouldn’t otherwise be sustainable.
READ MORE:
* Caregiving parents and partners of disabled people to be paid - Govt
* Disabled workers pay for wage pressures
* Calls to end 'discriminatory' minimum wage exemption scheme for disabled workers
* Closing sheltered workshops did more harm than good for intellectually disabled
“If we then had to pay the minimum wage, we couldn't then offer these customers the jobs at such a low price,” he said.
AttainAble’s situation is possible thanks to a government programme that allows agencies and companies to employ disabled people at a lower rate based on their productivity.
The scheme has been criticised by the United Nations as a “concerning” breach of disability rights, and the Government wants to scrap it.
But advocates say the changes are...
WASHINGTON, April 23 (Reuters) – President Donald Trump’s years-long campaign to undermine faith in U.S. elections has gained broad traction with the American public, a Reuters/Ipsos poll shows, p...