Aspiration and specialist support are key to young disabled people thriving in the workplace

The House of Lords’ Public Services Committee publishes its report ‘Think Work First: the transition from education to work for young disabled people’

• Report: Think Work First: the transition from education to work for young disabled people (HTML)
• Report: Think work first: The transition from education to work for young disabled people (PDF)
• Report: Think Work First: the transition from education to work for young disabled people: Shorthand Story
• Inquiry: The transition from education to work for young disabled people
• Public Services Committee
• Think Work First: the transition from education to work for young disabled people: Summary, Conclusions and recommendations: British Sign Language (BSL) subtitled video
• Think Work First: The transition from education to work for young disabled people: Summary, Conclusions and recommendations: EasyRead
• Think Work First: The transition from education to work for young disabled people: Summary, Conclusions and recommendations: Audio file

The House of Lords Public Services Committee has published its report, ‘Think Work First: the transition from education to work for young disabled people’.

The report concludes that young disabled people yearn to work and to thrive in their careers but far too many are written off and told that ‘people like them’ can never succeed.

The Committee believe we have to change this; we have to start with the presumption that young disabled people are fully capable of thriving in work, as long as they have the appropriate support, with aspiration and ambition at its heart. At every stage of a young disabled person’s development, from nurseries and schools to job centres and employers, we have to Think Work First.

Speaking on the report, the Chair of the Public Services Committee Baroness Morris of Yardley said “This report provides a blueprint for the new Government to implement its commitment to getting more young disabled people into work.

“It highlights how to put in place appropriate support for young disabled people and employers so that the system is both cohesive and effective.”

To address this, the Committee has recommended the Government focus on early support and intervention, ensuring that young disabled people can access and then remain in work once they leave education. It must also work with employers to ensure they have the tools and support they need to create inclusive workplaces and uphold the rights of disabled people.

Other significant key recommendations from the report include:

• Co-production: It is vital that young disabled people – both those that are yet to leave education and those who have already made the transition – are able to be fully involved in helping to design and shape the services that support them.
• Vocational profiling: This is a particularly effective way of identifying a young disabled person’s aspirations from an early age and can help schools and colleges to put the right careers support in place from the start. The Committee believes the Government should make vocational profiling a standard part of careers information, advice and guidance for young disabled people in schools.
• Joined up support: The Government should work with local authorities to improve the availability of ‘ready to work’ programmes, such as that provided by ThinkForward, to support young people from school until they are settled in work.
• Supported internships:. The new Government should honour the commitment of the previous Government to double the number of supported internships and take steps to make as many young disabled people as possible eligible for them: not just those with Education, Health and Care Plans. Internships should be particularly targeted at those with the highest support needs.
• Education:. The Government must review and improve the support that young disabled people receive while in education, and it must also properly support local authorities to deliver EHCPs, both in terms of application timelines and the robustness of decision-making.
• Careers advice: Many of the young disabled people who spoke to the Committee highlighted the poor careers advice they had received, and the Committee heard evidence from several witnesses of a lack of a systemic, specialised approach to training careers advisers working with young disabled people. The Government should review the training that careers advisers and leaders are expected to receive, making in-depth special educational needs training mandatory.

In order to ensure that these recommendations are implemented, to help young disabled people access work, Baroness Morris said: “We’ve asked the Government to provide us with regular updates on its progress with implementing our recommendations, and we look forward to receiving its response to this report.

“We want to see positive changes in the form of planned programmes and demonstrable actions not only to get young disabled people into the workplace, but to ensure they can thrive in their jobs, develop successful, sustainable careers, and realise their full potential.

“There are many excellent innovative schemes tackling the barriers that young disabled people face when trying to enter the workplace and helping them to make the transition from education to employment. However, we found that these are the exception rather than the rule and this has to change.”