Disability Confident Scheme

John Lamont Excerpts

Wednesday 10th January 2018 Westminster Hall

[Luke Graham (Ochil and South Perthshire) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the Disability Confident scheme.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Rosindell. I thank the Members who have made the effort to attend the debate, which I secured because I am a passionate believer in the ideals represented by the Disability Confident scheme, the support it offers and the progress it has made.

As recently as the 20th century, disability often prevented individuals from contributing to their communities and to society as a whole. At the turn of the 20th century, “defective” individuals were identified and separated from their communities through legislation such as the Mental Deficiency Act 1913. Meanwhile, adults who suffered an injury that caused a disability were often forced out of work and left reliant on rudimentary health and benefit schemes. Fortunately, in recent decades, Britain has made significant progress in guaranteeing rights and opportunities for disabled people. From the appointment of Britain’s first Minister for disabled people in 1972, to the discrimination and equality legislation of the 1990s and the early 21st century, our country has begun to catch up with the contribution, intellect and determination of so many disabled people across the United Kingdom.

I wish to cover three key components of the scheme in depth: the intent to provide equal opportunities for disabled people to be active participants in society; how the scheme contributes to reducing the disability employment gap; and how to encourage and engage employers to become more confident in employing and retaining disabled people.

First, let me expand on what I mean by intent. The Government should work to ensure that disabled people are not underrepresented in the workplace. Over the past seven years, it has been a common refrain of the Government not only that work should pay but that it is the most effective way of contributing to society. The logic of that belief is sound and has led to the Government overseeing the lowest unemployment in 43 years and, since 2010, the fastest rate of job creation. More than 600,000 more disabled people are in work now than were seven years ago. The employment rate among people with disabilities was 1.3 percentage points higher between April and June 2017 than in the same period in 2016, which means that the number of people with disabilities in employment rose by about 104,000.

Such opportunities help to provide work to formerly workless households and to provide disabled and non-disabled individuals with purpose, colleagues and community—factors that are widely recognised as helping to contribute to good physical and mental health. The Disability Confident scheme is consistent with that belief and complements other Government initiatives in work, welfare and health.

My second point is about the disability employment gap, which is defined as the difference between the employment rates among disabled and non-disabled people. There are currently 3.4 million disabled people in employment, which is approximately 49% of all disabled people. On its own, that sounds reasonable, but 80% of non-disabled people are currently in employment. The overall unemployment rate is 9% among people with disabilities but only 3.8% among people without disabilities. We should be determined to close that gap.

[John Lamont (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing the debate. Does he agree that we should aggressively pursue the UK Government’s target to halve the employment gap between disabled and non-disabled people, and that Disability Confident will help to reduce that gap?

[Luke Graham]

I could not agree more. That is a laudable target, but we should always try to go a little further. In my view, the target is there to be exceeded, and I am sure that the Minister will do everything she can to achieve that.

Let me dig a bit deeper and draw some gender and regional comparisons. Between April and June 2017, about 2 million women and 1.5 million men with disabilities were in work. That means that the employment rate among people with disabilities is about 50% for men and 48.6% for women. It is worth noting that more working-age women than working-age men have disabilities, which explains the discrepancy between the totals and the percentages of men and women with disabilities who are in work. However, the gap between the employment rates among women with and without disabilities is smaller than the equivalent gap for men. Although there is some reasonable news, it is tempered by the fact that the disability employment gap is still 27 percentage points for women and 35 percentage points for men.

It is also worth looking at the regional breakdown across the UK. Annual population survey data show that between July 2016 and June 2017 employment among disabled people was highest in the south-west of England, at 58.5%, and lowest in Northern Ireland, at just 36.7%. Scotland ranks third lowest in the UK, ahead of only Northern Ireland and the north-east, with a rate of 43.4% compared with the UK average of 49.7%. It is worth noting that those regional discrepancies by and large reflect the overall employment rates of the nations and regions of the United Kingdom.

The data highlight the issue at hand. I secured the debate so that we could continue to raise awareness in the Government and in the public and private sectors of the contributions and under-appreciated talent of disabled people in the UK and, in so doing, help to bridge the disability employment gap.

--- Later in debate ---

[Luke Graham]

I could not agree more. I hope that, through further speeches, we will hear more case studies and examples to try to raise the profile of the issue further. I know that the debate will not be left in this Chamber but that it will be continued by Members across the House in their constituencies and hopefully in the main Chamber. As I said, I urge cross-party support, because everyone has a role to play in helping to achieve the Government’s commitments as well as getting behind some of the Government’s policies and practical applications to try to ensure we achieve the targets set.

The Disability Confident scheme is about creating a movement for change, getting employers to think differently about disability and to act to improve recruitment and retention of disabled workers. The scheme has three levels that have been designed to support employers on their Disability Confident journey. An employer will complete each level before moving on to the next.

At the start of an employer’s Disability Confident journey, it can sign up via gov.uk with its Disability Confident commitments and identify at least one thing it can do that will make a difference for disabled employees. The second step is to become a Disability Confident employer. Such an employer will need to undertake a self-assessment, testing its business against a set of statements grouped into two themes: getting the right people for the business; and keeping and developing those people. For both themes, the employer will need to agree to take all of the actions set out in the core actions list and at least one from the activity list to make good on its commitment.

The final level, achieved by some Government Departments, is level 3, a Disability Confident leader. For that, an employer needs to meet two additional elements. First, it must challenge itself through self-assessment and open up to external challenge to ensure it really is pushing itself and delivering the best for its people. The second element is leadership within industry and among peers as well as with its own communities and supply chains.

By working through the scheme, employers also get access to a wide range of information, good practice and other resources, including links to Department for Work and Pensions programmes that can provide practical assistance. For example, Access to Work provision rose by 8% last year, and for some groups it rose at an even faster rate. For example, the number of deaf people who had support approved increased by 13%. There was also a significant increase in the number of people with provision approved who have mental health conditions, which was up 37%, and those with learning disabilities, which was up 25%. For young people aged 16 to 24, the increase was 26%.

Those metrics are all encouraging, and the scheme has the right intent and policies to progress. However, no scheme is perfect, as alluded to by other Members, so I ask the Minister and the Government team to look at continuously improving the scheme over the next few years and ensure that it is regularly reviewed so that we can check progress and see if anything can be done to provide UK employer incentives, especially for small and medium-sized enterprises, where cash is more constrained and it is more difficult to make the changes that would allow extra people to enter our workforce and increase our productivity.

[John Lamont]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for taking a second intervention. He described well the different levels of the scheme and employers who have signed up. Is there also a need to ensure that employers who have signed up do not rest on their laurels on the first level but are encouraged to move on, develop the programme and progress through the levels of the scheme?

[Luke Graham]

Absolutely—my hon. Friend makes a valid point. Even at level one, employers are making a commitment to take action within the next 12 months, and the mechanism must be used to ensure that those commitments are followed through. Commitments are easy to make online, but there needs to be the follow-through to make a real difference.

Quite simply, we cannot afford to allow any of our citizens’ talents to go to waste. For our United Kingdom to reach its full potential, every one of its citizens must reach theirs. Harnessing the skills and talents of everyone is at the heart of a successful economic plan, but good employment delivers much more than just a strong economy. Having a good job is good for our health: it keeps people healthy, both mentally and physically. I want disabled people to have every opportunity to go as far as their talents will take them. That is the sort of aspirational country I want to see, and that is what this scheme is starting to deliver.