Disability History Month 2024 - Disability, Livelihood and Employment

Disability History Month runs from mid-November to mid-December, with a changing focus each year. The 2024 Disability History Month will focus on “Disability, Livelihood and Employment”. While governmental statistics show that disabled employment is trending steadily upwards, the struggle to bring disabled employment figures up to that of non-disabled people continues.

Barriers to employment

If you are a non-disabled person, then the barriers that disabled people face every day at work may be alien to you. Disabled people can face issues from physical access to buildings, video-conferences that don’t have subtitles or IT that doesn’t support general text reading.

But not all barriers are physical. Some barriers can be organisational (having incredibly rigid absence policies or performance targets), some attitudinal (making assumptions of people based on pre-existing stereotypes) or social (exclusion from social events). 

In the UK, the Equality Act of 2010 protects disabled workers by prohibiting discrimination and requiring reasonable adjustments in workplaces.

The act requires employers to ensure they have accessible environments and equal opportunities for disabled employees and is meant to promote accessibility, prevent discrimination, and support equal participation for disabled people in employment, ensuring fair treatment and accommodating various needs, yet these barriers are everyday occurrences for so many disabled people.

These situations are at the heart of the movement for Disability History Month. How can these barriers be broken down and how can disabled employees’ quality of life be improved?

At CareCo, we’re doing our bit to help make disabled worker’s lives that bit more comfortable. We offer a range of products designed to enhance the independence and job satisfaction of individuals with disabilities.

For example, our mobility scooters provide reliable transportation, the Li-Tech Neon, for instance, is agile enough for both indoor and outdoor use, making it suitable for commuting and also manoeuvring within office environments. 

Comfortable and supportive seating is crucial for maintaining productivity in the workplace too, so we offer a range of adapted seating solutions, such as the U-Comfort Orthopaedic Coccyx Cushion, which provides increased comfort and orthopedically shaped support, helping users to maintain proper posture during extended periods of sitting. 

With these and other products, we help employees with disabilities to overcome a range of mobility challenges, to ensure they can perform their job roles effectively and with greater independence. 

When the world came to a standstill during the COVID-19 pandemic, the working world changed for everyone, disabled and non-disabled alike. Working from home became the mandate, desperately tuning into the daily news briefing on the BBC to find out when we’d be allowed some human contact again. But now, in a post-COVID world, working from home has become the norm for many people.

This can be a blessing in disguise. Your home will likely be most well-adjusted to you and your disability, so working from home, in most jobs, will be better than forcing yourself into the office. This is especially true for people like Sandra, who able to return to part time work, helping remotely with admin for the local nursery. The various mobility aids she has at home have helped her to work from home with greater ease.

But Disability History Month is also a celebration of disabled people. While the quest to improve the rights and living and working conditions of disabled people continues, it’s also a period of reflection for the success stories that continue to propel disabled rights into the public eye.

People like author, Liz Sayce OBE. Liz has been a leading figure in disability advocacy in the UK, having served as the CEO of Disability Rights UK and written extensively on equality and inclusion; or people like Ade Adepitan MBE, a prominent BBC presenter and former wheelchair basketball Paralympian; Ade speaks about disability and equal access across different media channels.

There are countless others, such as Dr. Amit Patel - author and accessibility advocate - a former A&E doctor who lost his sight, Amit is now an influential accessibility consultant, speaker, and author. His work focuses on raising awareness about the challenges and solutions in accessible urban design; or Sophie Morgan - television presenter and disability advocate (appearing on Loose Women and presenting the 2024 Summer Paralympics coverage for NBC Sports from their headquarters in Connecticut) - Sophie is a well-known TV presenter and one of the few disabled women in UK media. She’s actively involved in disability advocacy, particularly regarding accessible travel and media representation.

CareCo, a Disability Confident Employer

At CareCo, we take our responsibilities as a disability-conscious employer very seriously.

CareCo were extremely fortunate to already work with individuals who would be classified as having a disability - ranging from partially sighted, deafness, amputees and autism.

Reasonable adjustments have been made to accommodate these disabilities, such as special computer screens, improved access for wheelchair users and more. This has enabled us to automatically be accepted as a tier 1 Disability Confident Employer, and we are working towards our tier 2 certification now, by ensuring that all our recruitment advertising is visible to all, rather than just in the main stream recruitment websites. 

By adopting flexible policies, providing adaptive technology, and investing in inclusive hiring practices, companies can not only support a diverse workforce but can also enhance productivity and foster innovation. A commitment to accessibility and promoting a culture where everyone can thrive, benefits both everyone, from employees, to employers to customers.

We urge you to support Disability History Month in any way you can. If you can help to raise awareness or give whatever you can, you will be making a huge difference to the lives of so many.

To explore employment with CareCo, visit our Careers page here.