UK’s disability pay gap ‘wider than it was a decade ago’, research shows

Line managers often don’t feel comfortable talking about disability and this makes it harder for disabled people to get the support they need at work. That was the CIPD’s central message following the United Nations International Day of Persons with Disabilities. Observed across the world on 3rd December every year, it marks an opportunity to challenge some of the misconceptions that still exist around disability and promote greater awareness of the challenges facing people with disabilities in the workplace. 

People Management covers this with an opinion piece called ‘Do we really understand disability?’ from Diane Lightfoot, CEO of Business Disability Forum. It centres on four misconceptions. First, that disability is always present from birth. Second, that disability equals wheelchair users. Third, that workplace adjustments are expensive. Fourth, that everyone who has a disability describes themselves as disabled.

The TUC’s view is that employers are not doing enough in this arena, especially around pay, slamming what they say is ‘zero progress’ made on closing the disability pay gap in the last decade. In mid-November they published data showing how the gap between non-disabled and disabled workers is now 14.6% – higher than it was a decade ago. Looking ahead to a possible change of government, the TUC says Labour’s New Deal for Working People would be a "game changer" for disabled workers, introducing mandatory disability pay gap reporting and a day one right to flexible work.

Understanding the pay gap faced by disabled workers is the heading of an Out-Law analysis piece by discrimination specialist Amy Hextell. She cites lack of flexibility and the impact of part-time working as significant factors, along with a level of discrimination which persists. On that point she says: “some employers are still reluctant to hire or promote people with disabilities, whether because of discriminatory perceptions about ability and reliability, or because making adjustments and accommodating people with disabilities is wrongly considered to be more difficult and costly than hiring people without disabilities.”

So let’s get a view on this. Earlier, Amy joined me by video-link from Birmingham to discuss it:

Amy Hextell: “When it comes to collating data for all sorts of different things within the workplace, gender slightly more obviously, although there are still nuances to that, but certainly in respect of race, ethnicity and, particularly, disability there is a lack of good data. I think that is partly because there is no imperative on employers to be collating it from a legislative perspective, so there is no requirement to do that on a statutory basis, but I think that, in particular with disability, there are two things that impact it. The first is that there is still stigma associated with it. I think, to be entirely frank, there is still discrimination that goes on the basis of disability which is based on outdated stereotypes and a lack of proper understanding of what it means to be a disabled person and how disabled people can contribute to the workforce. The second thing, I think, is that some people with disabilities don't necessarily consider themselves to be disabled, perhaps because they don't meet the legal definition of having a disability, or they haven't got a blue badge when they park their car, those sorts of things and particularly those with neurodivergent conditions actually might consider their disability as an ability. So, it is quite a big step, and it takes a bit of recognition on your own part, if you are somebody with a disability, to actually come forward and consider yourself that way. So what we advise clients is to be quite clear in defining what you would consider to be a disability for the purpose of collating that data, which would hopefully encourage people to come forward a bit more and provide that valuable insight.”

Joe Glavina: “In your article, Amy, you say that a higher concentration of people with disabilities working part time roles helps contribute to the pay gap, and also you flag up a lack of flexibility in job roles. Tell me about those two points.” 

Amy Hextell: “The two things go hand in hand as regards to how part time working and those with disabilities are more likely to be engaged in part time work than full time work and how that contributes to the disability pay gap. They sound counterintuitive but, actually, they fit together quite nicely. So data supports that there's a higher concentration of people with disabilities in part time work than in full time work and that, I think, typically means that although you will prorate the salary and that sort of thing for a part time role, there is some difficulty in that part time roles are typically still lower paid, lower skilled, roles and, within an organisation, the roles that are seen as the roles that can be done on a part time basis are probably those that are lesser paid and lower skilled. So, obviously, having a concentration of people with disabilities in those roles means that it can contribute to a larger pay gap. Hand in hand with that goes the issue more generally of flexibility because quite often what is valuable to people with disabilities and, of course, it does depend on the individual and the type of disability that they have, but flexibility in performing their work role is often cited as being really key to keeping somebody in work and attracting somebody to a role in the first place. 
So, being able to work either on a part time basis, or work from home, or work in a different way to what you would typically expect for a role, is really important and still we find that the more senior, more well-paid roles, are roles where employers are less keen to allow those to be performed in a flexible way. So, again, people with disabilities are disadvantaged in obtaining those higher paid, higher qualified, roles because the flexibility that they require in terms of their adjustments, and the ways of working, are just not on offer from employers.”

Joe Glavina: “So what’s your final message to HR viewers watching this, Amy?” 

Amy Hextell: “I think the message for HR in terms of the steps that can be taken to address this and to try and capture the disability pay gap within your organisation, and then address it and try and make it a smaller gap, are things that you probably hear in respect of other protected characteristics and underrepresented groups as well. They are things like when you're advertising for roles, making clear that they are absolutely available on a flexible basis, but not just saying the words, giving examples as to how that that might be done. So it might be that a role is advertised as full time but open to part time applicants, or that it will be advertised as a hybrid role where you could work from home. Making a clear statement, I think, sometimes in respect of reasonable adjustments can be helpful because although the law requires employers to make reasonable adjustments for people with disabilities, in reality what we see is employers sometimes aren't proactive enough about that and so making a proactive statement, whether that be in advertisements as part of the application process or, indeed, to your existing workforce, around your openness and willingness to consider adjustments, and genuinely consider them. I think that what employers sometimes don't recognise is that the law, insofar as disability is concerned, goes further than some of the other types of discrimination which is there is a positive duty to be making reasonable adjustments and what is reasonable, as interpreted by the tribunals, is increasingly becoming a broader range of things. So, not just things like part time working, but job sharing or, particularly at the moment, the use of AI, perhaps, and software and technology to support people in performing their roles. So that's something that employers and HR teams ought to be doing. I think the Disability Confidence Scheme is something that employers can sign up to and it almost acts as like an accreditation to show that you are an employer that recognises the importance of supporting disabled people in work. So, you know, applying for that. being part of that, and including that accreditation, again, in your outward messaging to the workforce would be important. Thirdly, HR teams need to be, I suppose, tackling the stigma, in as far as you can, around disability to try and encourage people to be providing you with data which will inform them the decisions that you make, I think as part of that diversity data gathering, as I said, it's really important to have a clear definition of what is considered a disabled person for the purposes of that exercise so that you get meaningful data come through, then being really clear on why you're collecting the data and what you're going to do with it. So not simply saying we're collecting it because we want to understand how many disabled people are in our workforce. More about the active and proactive steps, in a similar way to how many employers have been doing it for a number of years now with the gender pay gap. Similar sort of thing, but with a disability lens applied to it.”

Amy has written about this in some detail in her analysis piece: ‘Understanding the pay gap faced by disabled workers’. That’s available from the Out-Law website and we’ve included a link to in the transcript of this programme for you. We’ve also included a link to the People Management article ‘Do we really understand disability?’ which deals with a number of common misconceptions about disabled people. It’s a helpful reminder and well worth reading.

LINKS
- Link to People Management article: ‘Do we really understand disability?’
- Link to Out-Law article: ‘Understanding the pay gap faced by disabled workers’