Disabled People and Economic Growth

Stephen Lloyd Excerpts

Thursday 22nd February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Lloyd (Eastbourne) (LD)]

I pay tribute to the hon. Member for East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow (Dr Cameron), the chair of the all-party parliamentary group for disability. I have been working on this issue on and off for over 20 years, so it is interesting that, despite all the efforts made by many people over the years, we still have just under 4 million people with disabilities who are called economically inactive, which means that they are of working age but not employed.

There has been some progress, however, and I remember working with others many years ago to support the then Conservative Prime Minister John Major in getting the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 passed. The DDA was an absolute game changer and created a regulatory framework to ensure that people could not discriminate against disabled people in goods and services or in employment. The reason why that was such a game changer is that disability discrimination is rather peculiar in that it is quite often tacit, quiet or nuanced. It could be what I call the “poor you” model. People may say, “You poor, brave disabled person. Here, have a benefit and do not worry about working.” We do not mean to do that—it is partly based on human nature and partly on a lack of understanding—but it can be incredibly difficult to break through. It was that way many years ago, and it can still be like that, although there has been some progress over the years.

The DDA worked well around goods and services. For example, if I have a restaurant and do not put a ramp outside, the disabled person in a wheelchair who cannot get in can sue me. It is very straightforward, and the situation is easy to fix. There may be cost implications, but most businesses got over that quickly, and as the chair of the APPG will know, when a business makes itself accessible, it often makes more than enough money to pay for the costs of improving accessibility.

Things are much harder, though, with employment, particularly if someone who is disabled is applying for job. If someone works for a company and acquires a disability, the DDA and broader knowledge in general mean that businesses, whether in the public sector or the private sector, are much more likely to make the necessary effort to keep them in a job. It is much harder for someone with a disability—they could be blind, visually impaired, deaf or have autism—to get over the threshold and get a job. I struggled with that issue many years ago with some good disability consultants, and I will mention them in the House because they have done so much over the years: Phil Friend, Simon Minty and James Partridge, a former chief executive of Changing Faces, which is a charity for those with a facial disfigurement. The four of us worked for many years in this area with the Business Disability Forum to try to break through, and it was difficult.

After losing my seat at the 2015 election, I went away and have now come back, and the APPG is still going great guns under the hon. Member for East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow. However, when I read the Government’s “Improving Lives” report, I still feel a little downhearted, which is not my nature. Anyone who is a Liberal and downhearted is in the wrong party, because we need to be optimistic, but progress is hard. However, I want to offer a little story of when things work, which can be game-changing for both disabled people and businesses. About 10 years ago, I was working with one of the big utility companies, and it had a large call centre in north London. I am sure that Members know that the turnover in call centres is always high, because it is a difficult job. The utility company had about 100 staff and, along with several others, I worked with the company to persuade it to take on 15 people with disabilities as call centre agents. It was hard work, but, to give the company its due, it did agree.

As I said earlier, the difficulty is not about people being anti-disabled; it is about fear, anxiety and people not knowing how to deal with circumstances that they do not understand. People often just lift the carpet and sweep people with disabilities under it, which I have always found frustrating. It makes me angry, and I know that other Members share that view.

Going back to the call centre, the company did finally agree, we found the right number of disabled staff to be interviewed, and 15 or so were hired. A year later, 14 of them were still there. Two years later, there were still 14 there. The point is that one of the fundamental advantages of hiring disabled staff is that they are often much more reliable than non-disabled staff for several different reasons, some of which are plainly evident. That makes the business case for hiring disabled people very strong, but they will need some guidance and support, not least because of their disability. My disability is hearing loss, so I need an induction loop, which I use in the Chamber, and a phone with a special volume control. It is just a matter of providing the right facilities, which is where Access to Work often comes in, to allow disabled people to shine.

Quiet discrimination is the much bigger issue. Disabled people may be viewed as not really capable, or employers may not know how to deal with a situation, so they may again sweep such things under the carpet. All those sorts of things are incredibly difficult to change, so where are we at? The Government’s Green Paper on improving lives was good because it highlighted some of the figures: 3.7 million disabled people are economically inactive. Another figure I have read is that if 1% of disabled employment and support allowance claimants gain employment, it would save the Exchequer £250 million and boost the economy by a further £260 million—that is £0.5 billion—which seems an awful lot of money from making an extra little effort to help people get jobs.

Every Government face disability challenges. It is hard for people to get back into work if they have been out of work for many years, but with the right levels of support, work is transformational for those individuals and families. A 2016 report by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation found that half of all households in poverty have at least one disabled member.

One of the reasons why many of us are MPs is that we know that helping people to get a job breaks the cycle of poverty, and that is certainly one of the main reasons why I got involved in politics. It just takes something focused. It is not enough just to say well-meaning things. I have been involved in this for years, probably more than anyone in the House, and well-meaning is not enough; regulation is needed.

I am tremendously appreciative of the fact that the Conservative Prime Minister John Major and his Government introduced the DDA—I do not often stand up in the House and compliment Conservatives—because it forced people to change. People with emotional attitudes often do not realise that they could be wrong or that they could be discriminating, which is why, even as a Liberal, there are certain times when I believe that we need to legislate. The DDA was one, and seatbelts was another. I am old enough to remember the uproar when seatbelts became compulsory—people said it was the end of the world as we know it. What happened is that people had to wear seatbelts, and they got busted by the law if they did not. Since then, as we all know, the number of people dying in car accidents has plummeted. It is the same with disability.

What needs to be done now, further to the DDA? All these years later, we still have not made enough progress. There need to be specific incentives for businesses to recruit disabled people. As the hon. Member for East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow mentioned, there needs to be specific action on procurement. We need to be that prescriptive to break the logjam. The need is greater than ever because with Brexit, whatever side of the divide we sit on, we know that there will be substantial staff shortages over the coming years. In fact, a recent report identified that there will be 32 areas of staff shortages in tier 2 occupations. It has become ever more relevant to try to square this circle.

I will not let the Government off the hook completely. It was not the decision of the current Disabilities Minister—this is not personal—but this Government’s decision to change the work-related activity group of ESA so that people receive a lot less money is foolish and short-sighted. There are three areas of ESA: the support group, which is for people with a disability such that they cannot work; basic ESA, at the front end; and, in the middle, for many years there has been WRAG.

WRAG recognises that a claimant has a disability and pays them a bit of extra money, above and beyond the normal jobseeker’s allowance, because those claimants face extra costs due to their disability, but WRAG also recognises that those claimants are ready to work with support. That is really important, because it got people into the frame of mind of being ready to take a risk and leave the structure of the support group of ESA.

After the coalition, after the Liberals were defenestrated, George Osborne quickly cut WRAG by 30%. I was really depressed about it when the change came into effect in April 2017, because I knew what would happen. It is human nature. We should never underestimate the strength of fear for a person in the support group who has been disabled for years and who has been outside work but who is ready, with a little encouragement, to step into WRAG and to try to go for a job.

If I were that person, having been promptly told that my allowance is being cut by 30%, I would do whatever it takes to stay in the support group, because that is human nature. It is not rocket science. It is not bad. It is what people would do. It is what I would do. Even someone as intrepid as you, Mr Deputy Speaker, would do it because at least they would then be secure, with money for the roof over their head, for their children, for food and the rest. Reducing WRAG was such a foolish idea, and I am bitterly disappointed that the Government did it. It is a classic case of the Government cutting off their nose to spite their face.

Since being re-elected, I have had shedloads of post from disabled people trying frantically to get back into the support group, and I am supporting them. I would like the Minister to address that, and perhaps to take back to the Chancellor the fact that reducing WRAG was a bad idea. Perhaps we can change it.

Finally, where are we at? Again, I am grateful to the hon. Member for East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow for securing this important debate that affects hundreds of thousands of people across the country. There is not an MP in this House who does not have hundreds, if not thousands, of disabled constituents. This is so important, as we know from our casework and from how many people with disabilities come to see us for help and support.

I would love to see this Government, or a Government, step up and do a DDA part 2 on employment that says businesses, the private and public sectors, organisations and charities across the piece have to do x to employ x number of disabled people, or at least to show that they have systems and processes and that they have interviewed the requisite number of people with disabilities for every job. I do not want it to be tokenistic, as a lot of people with disabilities have tremendous skills—they just need the opportunity. If that happens, it will transform the employment opportunities for disabled people and it will transform many millions of families living in poverty in which one or both parents are disabled. It will be the game changer that this nation deserves, and it might just possibly be something positive to come out of Brexit.