Vernon Daley, Staff ReporterTHE LONG struggle to have a law enacted to protect the disabled community is soon to bear fruit, says Government Senator, Floyd Morris.
The blind Senator, who is also Minister of State in the Labour and Social Security Ministry, said a submission is soon to go before Cabinet for a national disability law.
"That will assist in giving teeth to the National Disability Policy, which was tabled in this honourable chamber approximately two years ago," Senator Morris told the Senate yesterday, while making his contribution to the State of the Nation debate.
Two years ago, Senator Morris tabled a resolution in the Senate calling on the Government to give legislative support to the disability policy which had been previously brought to Parliament.
The policy was developed in keeping with the United Nations' Standard Rules for the Equalisation of Opportunities for Persons with Disabilities. It deals with 10 areas of public life in which disabled persons are disadvantaged - education, vocational training, employment, accommodation, communications, housing and accessibility, political and civil rights, family life, culture and recreation and sports.
Poor access to education was one of the major impediments faced by disabled persons, the document said. It added that 75 per cent of disabled people had primary level education as their highest level of educational achievement, as compared with 50 per cent of the total population.
About 10 per cent had secondary education and 0.4 per cent were university educated. This compares with 30 per cent and 1.3 per cent, respectively, in the general population.
Senator Morris, in praising the work of the Government in assisting the disabled community, pointed to a number of high schools, which have been equipped with the necessary facilities to train disabled students.
"I want to commend the Ministry of Education, because in the construction of new buildings there is a programme to ensure that those buildings are designed and retrofitted with the requisite facilities to accommodate the disabled," he said.
He added that the Government had put in place a number of scholarships to assist students at the tertiary level to acquire a good quality education.
He said that very soon, two such scholarships valued at $100,000 each, will be announced.
Two scholarships are also being made available to disabled students to help them pursue studies at the Caribbean Institute of Technology. According to Senator Morris, the money is being provided through the controversial Intec Fund, which was set up to kick-start Government's information technology programme.
