Her words illustrate the challenges disabled freelancers can face: “Being a disabled freelancer is tough. Even with all of the pros, it’s often unpredictable, the work often feels unstable. You just don’t know what is going to come in at any given time. You don’t have things like sick leave, which is a massive con when you are dealing with a chronic illness, there’s no annual leave, and it’s very difficult to take days off.” Furthermore, the disability insecurity gap persists even in more senior and relatively secure roles, such as managers, CEOs and consultants. Nineteen per cent of disabled workers experience contractual insecurity in these roles relative to 12% of their nondisabled peers. This finding illustrates how entrenched the insecurity gap is across the occupational spectrum. GENDER AND ETHNICITY MATTER Personal characteristics, such as gender, can also impact the relationship between disability and insecurity. Disabled women are 2.2 times more likely than disabled men to experience severely insecure work. Working mothers are particularly likely to experience an additional parenting penalty because of high childcare costs and, for some, the need to work close to home. Nearly one in three black and ethnic minority disabled workers (29%) are in severely insecure work. Qualitative research suggests that disabled workers from an ethnic minority background feel that their job security is based on keeping their disability invisible because of the anticipated discrimination based on their race and disability. CLOSING THE GAP There are several short and long-term policy changes the UK Government can undertake that will help close this insecurity gap. In the short-term, we have called on the Government to scale up the Access to Work (AtW) programme. The scheme provides a discretionary grant that goes towards the disability-related extra costs disabled workers face. This additional help could include hiring a support worker or purchasing specialist equipment. When it works, AtW can be transformative for disabled workers, but there are huge delays in accessing support and processing applications which mean that many disabled workers do not get the support they need to stay in work. Reforming the statutory sick pay (SSP) system, which is one of the least generous in the OECD, is vital too. For those who do qualify for SSP, employers are only required to pay employees from the fourth day of absence. Many of those in insecure work do not qualify for any sick pay at all because of the lower earnings threshold. As many disabled workers have fluctuating conditions, removing the threshold and making SSP more generous will mean fewer disabled workers will be forced to leave their job altogether whenever their condition deteriorates. In the long-term, more structural change is required. Strengthening employment rights and protections for workers across the labour market will disproportionately benefit disabled workers as they are more likely to be in insecure work. The UK Government must also ensure that disabled people interacting with the benefits system are protected from punitive conditionality requirements and the threat of sanctions. This will ensure that disabled people can look for work that will help them to better manage their disability as opposed to “any job” that might not be suitable for them. Tackling the disability insecurity gap will enable disabled workers to fulfil their potential at work which in turn, will benefit their employers and the wider economy. FIFTY FOUR DEGREES | 49 Aman Navani is a Research and Policy Analyst with the Work Foundation at Lancaster University, a leading think tank for improving working lives in the UK. The report The Disability Gap: Insecure Work in the UK, is authored by Aman Navani, Rebecca Florisson and Melanie Wilkes, of the Work Foundation. a.navani@lancaster.ac.uk
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