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Westminster AchieveAbility Commission into recruitment practice for dyslexic and neurodivergent people wants to hear from you.

Briefing

Chaired by Barry Sheerman MP with Lord Addington as adviser, this Commission will investigate work related recruitment and build on existing research such as the recent ACAS report ‘Neurodiversity at Work’. The Commission will feed into the government goal of ‘Halving the Disability Employment Gap’ by 2020. As dyslexic people, and those who are neurodivergent, represent the highest percentage of adults who are disabled (British Dyslexia Association) this Commission is vital in order to represent the issues for this community, as well as revealing their intellect, value and strengths within the workplace. The Commission will investigate the barriers to employment and identify recruitment processes that disadvantage neurodivergent people (autism, ADHD, dyslexia, dyspraxia, dyscalculia, asperger’s). The aim is to find out how recruitment and probation processes might be improved and highlight good practice in these areas. This investigation has just got underway with a set of surveys to employers and neurodiveregent people followed by evidence sessions from key experts.

Intended outcomes

  • To close the Neurodiverse employment gap
  • To profile a set of good practice case studies and good practice
  • To demonstrate the barriers
  • To consider how dyslexic and neurodivergent people deal with disclosure in the workplace
  • To feed into the government’s stated aim of Halving the Disability Employment Gap
  • To outline a series of recommendations on policy, law and practice

In 2009, a City University report by Professor Logan noted that 35% of entrepreneurs were dyslexic. In 2012 research identified 300,000 dyslexic entrepreneurs (Halfpenny, J Halfpenny C. 2012). Yet the neurodiverse face barriers due to the lack of understanding of their skills and abilities by employers, networks, educationalists, businesses and policy makers. This situation has significant economic repercussions with Dyslexia Action in 2007 estimating that unrecognised dyslexia cost the UK economy £1 billion per year. As a result there is a significant gap between the percentage of disabled dyslexic and neurodivergent people in employment, and the rest of the population. In an attempt to address this, the Conservative Party committed to halving the disability employment gap by 2020 in its 2015 Election manifesto.

The Commission aims to bring positive change by bringing people together to publish and promote this evidence. The ensuing report will outline a series of recommendations and is to be launched during Dyslexia Awareness Week, 2017. This work will provide other campaigning groups a platform from which to push this agenda further, aligned with the government’s stated aim of ‘Halving the Disability Employment Gap’. With a Green Paper on employment on the way, there could be no better time to highlight the employment needs of this large population and point to better recruitment practices for the global economy.

If you would like to participate in this survey, please go to this link:

https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/AchieveAbility01

Chrome extensions and https://www.atbar.org/ will work on surveymonkey, however if you would like an alternative format, please contact AchieveAbility:

Westminster AchieveAbility Commission (WAC)
email: westcommission@achieveability.org.uk
Mobile: 07375655699
Twitter.com/AchieveAbility1
http://www.achieveability.org.uk/main/policy/new-commission

 

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