“Supported employment is not only job coach but it also helping the person find the right job,” said Marthese Mugliette, President of the Malthese Federation of Organisations of Persons with Disabilities (MFOPD).
Inclusive employment starts from the interview, it has to do with team management, and it looks at how the person can grow in the job but also in life.
From 2 to 4 November I was invited to speak in a series of workshops organised by the Malta Association of Supported Employment (MASE) and the Ministry for Inclusion and the Voluntary Sector in Malta.
The workshops gathered people with intellectual disabilities who want to work, employers who wants to hire, people willing to support inclusive jobs like support services and policy-makers.
There was one pending question during the 3 days: how do we make inclusive jobs happen?
What I heard
People with intellectual disabilities speaking about why it is important to have a job:
- “I enjoy going to work because I meet my friends.”
Family members expressing their concerns about the lack of jobs, and the lack of knowledge of inclusive jobs:
- “My daughter was invited to an interview which lasted all of 5 minutes. How can my daughter be assessed in 5 minutes?”
Employers willing to change the situation:
- “It makes business sense.”
But employers also said they “cannot find people with disabilities to employ”.
I also learned about Malta’s existing support programs, like the MASE promoting specifically supported employment, and a specific service named Lino Spiteri Foundation.
However, only some people with intellectual disabilities are employed in the open labour market in Malta. 827 people with an intellectual disability are registered with the public employment service and not in work on 31 July 2026.
This means most adults with intellectual disabilities just stay home or attend “day care”.
What I brought
I did not come to tell Malta what to do, they know their own island. What I brought was some examples and tools that might be useful in improving the situation.
Tamara Byrne, a self-advocate from Ireland, says what employers often miss:
- “People see me and think I can only do certain things so they don’t even give me a chance, it doesn’t occur to people that I might be well able to do more and be really good at it.”
Joe Kingdom shows what happens when someone does give a chance. He graduated from Breaking Barriers in Scotland and now works at ENABLE:
- “It has been such a confidence booster for me.”
From Spain, I shared the customised employment of Plena inclusión: build the job around the person, not the person around a job.
- In an independent program with 512 people, 7 more people in every 100 were in work than with traditional supported employment.
Five tools from the Inclusive Workplaces Toolkit of Inclusion International.
- An accessible job description. Interview questions in plain language. A team role introduction. A weekly workplan. A support and adjustments checklist.
The reason to try them is simple. According to the European Commission, 60% of workplace adjustments cost nothing.
Freddy Jussien, Advocacy Lead, Inclusion Europe
