Disability Roadshow – Video Transcript
Narrator: How many disabled people do you employ? An estimated 1 in 5 employees
already has a mental health problem. And there are over 7 million working aged disabled
people in Britain.
Despite this, more than 50% of disabled people are currently unemployed. Now that’s a lot
of talent and potential gone to waste.
But you can change this. By being disability confident, your business can benefit from:
- Job ready candidates.
- A pool of skilled potential employees
- Social responsibility – the opportunity to tackle discrimination
- Proven success – employment experts with a history of placing great candidates with
employers
- Ongoing support - unlimited advice to help you along the way
Here are just a few success stories of the employers who became disability confident, and
the employees whose lives were changed because of it.
Alan: Scott came to us on a work placement from Glenwood School, proved himself and
with the support from the school and his parents, we gave him a job on 4 hours a week.
It’s good to have Scott working for us because he helps the other guys, he gets on well with
the other fellas, interacts well, hard working and he’s a pleasure to have on the team.
Tania: I work at Tendring mental health support, I work on reception, answer the telephone,
write messages down, do general office duties. Make sure that the office is tidy by sweeping
up. I see lots of support, um, welfare things and day-to-day support in that learn new skills. I
got a lot of support with everybody which I think is really nice… and friendly and helpful as
well.
I love my work, it’s really rewarding and gives me independence and my wellbeing’s been
better, confidence to learn new skills. It has changed my life.
Tom: I’m on a work placement with North Essex Partnership. I work as a communications
assistant at the trust headquarters.
Martin: Tom came to me through our work support programmes that the trust runs. Um,
the person who supports him, Tina, came to me and said that she had someone who she
was supporting who she thought would be ideal in my team. We arranged to meet, talked
to Tom, talked about the sort of things I wanted someone to do, about his skillset and it was
a perfect match and its been highly successful.
Tom: In my role I have a dedicated employment specialist, Tina, who gave me the
placement in the first place and is always on hand on the phone or via email with any
questions of queries or problems that I might have.
Tina: As employment specialists what we do is we help and support people with secondary
mental health back into work so we work with everybody on an individual basis and what
we do is we look at their skills and what skills they’ve got, where they’d like to go to work
and what kind of work they’d like to do then we match them skills to employers in the essex
area.
Tom: My work placement at the NEP has changed me tremendously it’s given me the
confidence and the skills to look at going back into work. Over time I see it as haven given
me structure in my life again. When you’re out of work everything tends to become a bit ‘oh
I’ll do that tomorrow’ but now I’m getting back to thinking as a working person, my mind is
getting back to working as a working mind and I find that’s very important.
Gavin: I work as a technical clerk here at Ford Motor Company, where I help aid and assist
35 engineers in their daily tasks. Currently I’ve been studying a new process which is to be
able to pack as many items -new production items into boxes and container packages the
best way we can and ship them around the world to and from the plants and the suppliers.
Tony: Gavin has worked for us for about 15 years on and off. Gavin is a technical clerk and
he organises all our travel and overtime, we travel to various plants and suppliers. Recently
there’s been the need to get a CAD operator looking after our packaging and we asked
Gavin, because of his technical knowledge, would he like to move up and he has accepted
that position. Physically we haven’t had to make any adjustments at all for Gavin. Gavin can
access his work place easily enough and his desk space is just like anybody else’s desk space
and chair in fact. Gavin is a real character, he is an integral part of our team and he has a
really wicked sense of humour.
Gavin: Working here at Ford Motor Company, it’s good for me and it’s good for the
company – I feel great! I’m treated fairly, I’m able to express my feelings and emotions that
are clearly understood and I’m given the opportunity to be a person.
Narrator: So, how can you become a Disability Confident employer? The answer’s simple:
come and talk to us. No matter the position you want to fill our partners will work with you
to find great employees that’ll contribute to the success of your business. Visit our website
to find out how your business can become Disability Confident, today.