Major companies join disability employment campaign

The Disability Confident initiative launched by the Department for Work and Pensions has attracted more than 20,000 businesses, including companies such as Ford, Hilton, Coca-Cola and Sainsbury’s.

For its five-year anniversary, Disability Minister Chloe Smith urged more businesses to sign up to the Disability Confident Scheme.

Smith was speaking ahead of a visit to London’s Hilton Hotel – who is a Disability Confident member – to meet three members of staff who benefited from the scheme.

Figures released show that firms now have a total of 11 million employees who are involved in the scheme, with over 20,000 companies joining. The scheme aims to improve how to recruit, retain and develop disabled employees’ skills.

Smith said about the boost in the scheme: ‘All disabled people deserve equal opportunities to thrive at work.

‘Through our Plan for Jobs and schemes like Disability Confident we are working towards making this a reality, with employers like Hilton showing what is possible. The latest disability employment figures show we are making progress, with an additional 300,000 in work over the past year, but we remain focused on increasing this further, seeing one million more disabled people in work by 2027.I’m calling on more businesses to become Disability Confident, to create inclusive and accessible jobs and reap the benefits it brings.’