Disabled workforce | EXCLUSIVE: MP calls on more businesses to employ disabled workers

Grant Shapps MP has called on businesses to consider employing more disabled people saying that employers who do “often tell [him] that they get a better level of work and greater loyalty.”

Speaking exclusively to HR Grapevine, at a Disability Confident meeting, the DWP scheme dedicated to getting employers to take steps to attract, recruit and retain disabled workers, the ex-Minister for International Development explained that, at a time when some businesses cite problems with talent attraction, employers shouldn’t be discriminating against certain sections of the workforce.

He said: “The first thing, you wouldn’t lock out half the potential workforce, such as women, in days gone by, and then expect to be a successful business or a successful economy because that’s just arbitrarily taking people out of economy.

“On a smaller scale, why would you take people who happen to have a disability and remove them from the workforce and then expect to get the very best person for the job?"