Up to 10,000 Australians with intellectual disabilities, who worked for as little as just 99¢ an hour, will share in a massive $100 million federal government payout after a landmark discrimination lawsuit.

"We will no longer have workers with intellectual disabilities working in Dickensian conditions," Maurice Blackburn partner Josh Bornstein said on Friday.

Tyson Duval-Comrie. Credit:James Boddington

"This class action settlement will help to right the wrongs that have been committed."

Across the nation thousands of people with disabilities are employed in packaging, manufacturing and cleaning jobs at hundreds of Australian Disability Enterprises, formerly known as "sheltered workshops".