Consultation on disability workforce reporting
The UK government is consulting on workforce reporting on disability for large employers.
The consultation explores voluntary and mandatory disability workplace reporting for businesses with more than 250 employees to better understand how different approaches to reporting might support the goals of increasing inclusive working environments and address the disability employment gap.
According to government figures, more than 7.7 million people of working age in the UK are disabled or have a health condition. Disabled workers move out of work at nearly twice the rate of non-disabled workers and workless disabled people move into work at nearly one-third of the rate of workless non-disabled people. The gap remains consistent despite evidence suggesting significant benefits to businesses that employ disabled people.
The National Disability Strategy, published in July 2021, recognised the importance of enabling disabled people to obtain, retain and progress in work.
There is currently a voluntary reporting framework, which provides support to employers to voluntarily report information on disability, mental health and wellbeing in the workplace.
The consultation is open to employers and their representative groups, disabled people, disabled people’s organisations, disability staff networks and representatives and researchers in the field.
The consultation remains open until 25 March and a response is due to be published by 17 June 2022. More information about the consultation is available here.