10th October 2007

The number of disabled people placed into work by Remploy in the Lanarkshire area in the first six months of the year increased by almost 30 per cent compared with the same period last year.

Half yearly employment statistics from Remploy, the UK’s leading provider of employment services for disabled people, show that the company found 115 jobs in mainstream employment within a 12-mile radius of the company’s factory at Excelsior Park.

The figure, for the six months to the end of September, compares with 89 in 2006. Remploy aims to be finding jobs nationally for 20,000 disabled people each year by 2012.

Around a quarter of the jobs are professional or secretarial, a quarter are in warehousing and logistics and the rest in a wide range including manufacturing and machine operating, sales, retail, catering, hygiene and hospitality.

Remploy is engaged in consultations with trade unions over its modernisation plans which will enable it to achieve this quadrupling of jobs over the next five years. The company’s proposals involve the closure of 42 loss-making factories.

The Lanarkshire factory, which undertakes wheelchair assembly and white goods recycling, and employs 54 disabled people, is proposed for closure.

Bob Warner, Remploy Chief Executive, said: “Some people have expressed concerns that there are no suitable jobs for disabled people near the factories which may be affected by our modernisation programme.

“These latest figures show that we are making excellent progress in not only identifying appropriate vacancies in Lanarkshire, but actually helping disabled people into good, sustainable employment. In areas where closures are planned, we expect to double the number of vacancies on our books by the end of the year.

“The people we have placed into jobs in the last six months have the same range of disabilities as our factory employees and we are working hard with the trade unions to ensure that we provide as many employment opportunities as possible for disabled people.

“It is essential that we reach agreement quickly with the unions on the modernisation programme so that we can continue to increase the number of jobs that we find for disabled people in mainstream employment in Lanarkshire.

“The alternative is that over the next five years more than 40,000 disabled people will remain on benefit instead of enjoying the benefits of a rewarding and satisfying job.”

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