Reducing the disability gap

A team of Cardiff University researchers is leading the debate around reducing the disability employment gap in the UK. A recent conference - Closing Disability Gaps at Work - organised by the School of Social Sciences, aimed to inform various organisations' responses to the Green Paper issued by the UK Government as the first step towards meeting their pledge to halve the gap between the employment rates of disabled and non-disabled people by the end of the current parliament. It also served the purpose of bringing together the different kinds of organisations that have an interest in improving the lives of disabled people such as the umbrella body Disability Rights UK and national charities like Macmillan Cancer Support. The conference opened with key presentations from Dame Professor Carol Black, the government's special advisor on work and health, and Nicola Gilpin, Lead Analyst in the Government's Work and Health Unit. They were followed by sessions which highlighted the research done at Cardiff University on disabled employees and the disability gap, and then by four parallel workshop sessions which focused on policy solutions and innovations in practice. Professor Ralph Fevre of the School of Social Sciences was one of the key organisers of the event.