Think Work First: The Transition from Education to Work for Young Disabled People (Public Services Committee Report)

Lord Shinkwin Excerpts

Tuesday 4th November 2025 Grand Committee

[Lord Shinkwin (Con)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Morris of Yardley, and I commend her and her committee members on producing such an important and well-considered report. I will pick up on the point that the noble Baroness ended on, which is the title of the report. For me, it implicitly recognises that, for too long, work has been the very last thing that policymakers and politicians have instinctively associated with disabled people. The preconception that disabled people cannot contribute or realise their potential at work and, on merit, reach the top of their professions goes to the heart of our professional psyche. Indeed, its roots go deep in our societal culture. It is a culture which spawned the term “invalid”, a term still experienced today, in practice, in so many aspects of their life by disabled people.

So I thank the committee not only for recognising the scale of the challenge and for proposing a joined-up package of solutions, but for the title of its report, Think Work First. It is not just absolutely appropriate; it is instructive of the scale of the change in mindset that is required. For that is exactly the change we must make, and quickly—not just as policymakers but, as the noble Baroness, Lady Morris of Yardley, implied, all of us.

I will give two figures. The UK’s £2.9 trillion national debt and the £100 billion that we spent in the last year servicing that debt surely underline the fact that we are all paying the consequences and the costs of the 30% disability pay gap highlighted in the report and the unsustainable disability benefits bill for those who are out of work. It is therefore in all our interests to think work first. I am glad that, as the noble Baroness said, in several respects the Government have indicated that they intend to do so and to think work first, whether on vocational profiling, supported internships, in-principle support in education, including through EHCPs, and mandatory reporting of the disability pay gap, the efficacy of which, I argue, depends on disability employment reporting as well—this is a theme to which I will return. The fact that the Government are engaging with some of the committee report’s recommendations is surely a fitting tribute to its deliberations and its 36 common-sense recommendations.

I shall highlight the recommendations that I particularly welcome as a disabled Member of the House. These include increasing the number of supported internships; developing a transition information hub, co-produced with disabled people, as in Scotland; improving the support that young disabled people receive in the education system; the collection and publication of data on the number of careers advisers, especially those who have received specialist training relating to pupils with SEN; increasing work experience opportunities, including through supporting and incentivising local bodies, such as chambers of commerce, which I think is an excellent idea; improving the quality of accessibility information provided to students by universities; ensuring that work coaches and disability employment advisers fully understand the specific barriers that young disabled people face, including in the commissioning and use of assistive technologies; crucially, coming back to the committee and updating it on government action to reduce the access to work application backlog and delays; and the introduction of a four-week deadline by when employers must respond to an employee’s request for reasonable adjustments.

I could go on but I shall just highlight one other recommendation, which is making the Disability Confident scheme fit for purpose and credible by introducing rigour and transparency, so that employers are no longer marking their own homework and are instead subject to external, independent audit of the evidence as to whether they are hitting the thresholds for the percentage of their workforce that is disabled.

There is one other recommendation that I particularly highlight because, as a disabled person, I believe that it is crucial to the transition, indeed to the transformation, that we must all make to our cultural attitudes if we are truly to benefit, as a society, from extending equality of opportunity to disabled people and enabling them to realise, on merit, their potential at work. The recommendation that I am referring to is that the Government should ensure disability pay gap reporting, to which I would add disability employment reporting—that is, the percentage of an employer’s workforce that is disabled—being made mandatory for employers with 250 employees or more and for all Disability Confident leaders.

Page 43 of the report refers to the Disability Employment Charter, the brainchild of Professor Kim Hoque, who gave evidence to the committee and with whom I have been privileged to work for a number of years. Disability employment and pay gap reporting is the number one demand of the charter, which in practice has already been adopted, as the report comments, by employers such as EY, Capita and Clifford Chance. Mandatory reporting has also been supported as a recommendation by two commissions that I have chaired: first, the Centre for Social Justice’s Disability Commission, in its “Now Is The Time” report of March 2021; and, secondly, in the report produced in October 2022 by the Institute of Directors’ commission, “The Future of Business: Harnessing Diverse Talent for Success”. I pay tribute to Jon Geldart, the IoD’s director general, for his continuing commitment, and to Alexandra Hall-Chen, its principal policy adviser for employment, skills and sustainability, for building earlier this year on the commission’s work through the publication, in partnership with Disability@Work, of “Progress through Transparency: the Case for Mandatory Disability Employment and Pay Gap Reporting”.

As Professor Hoque made clear in his submission to the committee, mandatory pay gap reporting would be relatively straightforward if introduced in tandem with disability employment reporting. Establishing which employees are disabled will depend on the creation of a supportive work environment, using the Labour Force Survey definition of disability, so that disabled employees feel confident that they will not be penalised for their disability and that the data that they provide on their disability status will be treated as confidential. This is surely to the mutual benefit of any decent employer, keen to get the best from its workforce. Professor Hoque has also proposed a hybrid metric that accounts for both the employer’s disability employment levels and its disability pay gap in a way that does not unfairly represent those employers that, to their credit, are taking positive steps to hire more disabled people. I would be grateful if the Minister could update us on when we might expect the Government to respond to the consultation on mandatory reporting in line with the Labour Party manifesto and the Government’s King’s Speech commitments.

I finish on a rather despondent note, but one which underlines the urgency of moving ahead on the report’s recommendations. The CBI submitted what, to my mind, was a deeply discriminatory response to the consultation that I have just mentioned. I have told it so and I have asked that the response be withdrawn. It is completely unacceptable for an organisation like the CBI, or indeed any member organisation with a vested interest in the status quo, to perpetuate prejudice. I ask the Minister to confirm that the Government will treat responses that are based on outdated and costly attitudes, whereby disabled people are only ever regarded as a burden, with the contempt that they deserve.

In conclusion, the truth is that prejudice against disabled people is rife in Britain in 2025. In fact, I have never known it to be worse. The extent to which we have gone backwards since the demise of the Disability Rights Commission is disturbing, soul-destroying and, above all, disorienting. I never thought that we could be back in this place. That is why this report and its recommendations are so important. I urge the Government to show that they are responding to those recommendations with the urgency that they deserve.

People with Disabilities: Access to Services

Lord Shinkwin Excerpts

Thursday 16th May 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Shinkwin (Con)]

My Lords, I too thank the noble Baroness, Lady Hughes of Stretford, for this important opportunity to reflect holistically on the significant challenges that disabled people continue to encounter in so many aspects of their lives, as my friend, the noble Baroness, Lady Baroness Grey-Thompson, made clear. Like the noble Lord, Lord Touhig, I shall focus on employment, in my case as a former chair of a CSJ disability commission and the current chair of the IoD commission on the future of business: harnessing diverse talent for success. I refer Members to my register of interests in that that regard.

I ask myself, from a disabled person’s perspective, what success in addressing the challenges we face in employment might look like. What are the key performance indicators I would expect to see? Take the KPI of closing the disability employment gap, which my noble friend Lord Holmes of Richmond has mentioned. What progress has been made there? Not that much, it seems; it hovers stubbornly at around 30%, partly because disability prevalence at work has increased from 16.5% in 2013 to 24.6% in 2024. To what extent does the DWP take disability prevalence into account when calculating the disability employment gap?

I turn to Disability Confident, the Government’s flagship employment scheme for disabled people. How effective has that been? The DWP claims that 11 million people are now employed by Disability Confident firms, so surely there is clear evidence of a corresponding step-change improvement in both the disability employment gap and the disability pay gap. We know the answer on the disability employment gap. On the disability pay gap, the IoD commission that I chair recommended mandatory workforce reporting for big business, which would allow for its calculation. The director-general and I wrote to the Prime Minister 18 months ago, but to the best of my knowledge we have not received even an acknowledgment. That may not be a KPI, but it is certainly a revealing indicator of the Government’s disdain, which, unfortunately, was also on display in their car crash of an announcement last December about the role of the Minister for Disabled People.

What is the evidence that the Government’s flagship Disability Confident scheme actually improves disability employment outcomes? According to Professor Kim Hoque, from King’s College London, and Professor Nick Bacon—both of whom are from Disability@Work—the percentage of the workforce that is disabled is no higher in Disability Confident level 1 or level 3 organisations, and only marginally higher in private sector level 2 organisations, than in non-Disability Confident organisations. Also, the percentage of the workforce that is disabled is no higher, and disabled employees’ experiences of work no better, in organisations in the Disability Confident business leaders’ group than in non-Disability Confident organisations. Can my noble friend tell me how these findings are meant to inspire confidence among the primary stakeholders of the scheme—that is, disabled people?

Is my noble friend aware that, of the 129,000 jobs listed on the DWP’s Find a Job service, only 0.51% are fully remote and just 2.75% are listed as being hybrid remote? As Professor Hoque said when he gave evidence to the Work and Pensions Select Committee in the other place earlier this month:

“The idea that there are all of these working from home opportunities out there for disabled people … is just a complete myth”,


not least because competition for those jobs, scarce as they are, is going to be even higher.

Unjustified disability discrimination may have been outlawed on paper by the DDA 30 years ago, as already mentioned, but, far from being eradicated, it has in my experience as a disabled person instead become normalised because of a lack of enforcement, which has been informed not by malice but by a deficit of lived experience. Subsumed within the EHRC since the abolition of the Disability Rights Commission, the unique nature of disability and, thus, the need for reasonable adjustments has meant that disability is the heaviest stone, which inevitably falls to the bottom of the equality policy pond—and there it stays.

I want to look beyond where we are now to the next Parliament. I hope that the next UK Government recognise in policy design and implementation that our lived experience as disabled people is not only valid but valuable, and that harnessing it adds value and reduces costs over the medium term. I hope that the next UK Government carry out a review, led by a disabled person, of what is needed to ensure that the legislative framework is actually delivering in the way it was intended to for disabled people; and that, at the very least, that Government abide by the recommendations of the House of Lords ad hoc Select Committee, so ably led by the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, which found almost 10 years ago that the Equality Act 2010 was not working for disabled people.

In conclusion, unless and until disabled people are brought into the decision-making process on merit, including as Members of your Lordships’ House, the challenges we are discussing will remain and we will be having exactly the same debate in 10 years’ time as we are today.

Disability Employment Gap

Lord Shinkwin Excerpts

Wednesday 12th February 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stedman-Scott]

How can I say no to the noble Baroness? That is another great idea. It fits very well with the national disability strategy, which will, I am pleased to say, be developed with disabled people and disability charities and organisations, and will cover the areas outlined by the noble Baroness—housing, education, transport and jobs—so that people can improve their lives. I will be delighted to go back to the department, not to suggest a round table but to say that we are having one.

[Lord Shinkwin (Con)]

My Lords, can I add another idea to my noble friend the Minister’s list? It is testament to the influence of your Lordships’ House that only last week I introduced a Bill on exactly this issue, which already has the backing of major corporates such as EY and Enterprise Holdings. They know that there must be a level playing field for rewarding and incentivising best practice. Will the Minister take this idea back not just to her department but to the Government as a whole, for incorporation in the forthcoming employment Bill, so that the mandatory gender pay gap reporting duty is extended to other protected characteristics, including disability?

[Baroness Stedman-Scott]

I am going to start singing “I’ve Got a Little List” in a minute. I congratulate the noble Lord on his tenacity in this area. His work on Able to Excel and his Private Member’s Bill were excellent. In 2018, the Government published a voluntary reporting framework on disability, mental health and well-being in the workplace, aimed at large employers—those with more than 250 employees. In November, we announced the new level 3 of Disability Confident. We must work with businesses to crack that 77% of people who want to work. Employers create jobs; we must work closely with them. My noble friend’s work will help with this. I will arrange for him to come in and do the sell on that one.

Universal Credit

Lord Shinkwin Excerpts

Monday 5th November 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Buscombe]

My Lords, in all that we are doing with universal credit we constantly question and consider issues of substantive policy, because we want to make sure that the system works for the long term. The Government want to support people to be self-employed but it is right for them to be financially self-sufficient. Key to this is continuing to support people in, or considering, self-employment to progress to a level of sustained financial self-sufficiency. We recognise that it takes time for new businesses to grow and that even established businesses can experience difficulties. We will therefore provide all gainfully self-employed claimants with an equal chance and support from specially trained work coaches to grow their earnings, and to prepare and adjust for the application of the minimum income floor. We were going to move the minimum income floor to six months after migration, but have decided to introduce a grace period of 12 months.

[Lord Shinkwin (Con)]

My Lords, my noble friend mentioned the severe disability premium and the serious implications of not getting these regulations through. Will she confirm that these regulations support the most vulnerable claimants moving to universal credit and that, moreover, voting against them would deprive 500,000 claimants of that premium?

[Baroness Buscombe]

My noble friend is entirely right. I could not put it better myself. We have to make sure that we get these regulations through. If we do not, that support for half a million vulnerable people will be lost. The regulations provide transitional support for recipients of the severe disability premium while removing the complexity of dealing with different rules for seven different disability additions. We want to make sure that we take special care of those people when migrating them on to UC. As the CEO of Citizens Advice, Gillian Guy, said,

“improved protection for people who receive the Severe Disability Premium is a welcome move that will mean better financial security for many disabled people who move onto Universal Credit”.

We must have these regulations.

Benefits: Reductions

Lord Shinkwin Excerpts

Thursday 1st November 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Shinkwin (Con)]

My Lords, I too thank the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, for securing this debate. I will focus my remarks on universal credit as it affects disabled people. However, first I join other noble Lords in paying warm tribute to Baroness Hollis of Heigham. No one could doubt her passionate commitment and her expert knowledge of the system. I think the House misses her deeply.

More than one-third of claimants moving on to universal credit—UC as it is more generally known—through a process of managed migration will be disabled people, so it is crucial that the Government get the regulations governing managed migration right, and I look forward to seeing the recommendations of the Social Security Advisory Committee on the regulations and the Government’s response shortly.

Notwithstanding that, it is important to reassure disabled claimants that the Government are determined not only that UC should be a success, but that UC should help most those who need most help. That is why I welcome the fact that around 1 million disabled people will gain, on average, £110 more a month through UC. I also welcome the fact that the severe disability premium transitional payment rates reflect the extra financial support provided through the more generous limited capability for work-related activity component. Indeed, the rate for these UC claimants is significantly higher, at £328.32 a month, than £163.15 per month on the equivalent employment and support allowance support group. Targeting support to the most vulnerable through the severe disability premium will benefit 500,000 people.

I also take comfort from the way the Government are listening and acting in response to issues raised by colleagues in the other place, such as the well-respected champion of social justice Iain Duncan Smith, who has publicly welcomed the Budget announcements on UC. The Government’s “test and learn” approach is surely wise because it allows them to make improvements to the system as it gradually rolls out. Changing the start date of the process of managed migration from January to July 2019 and focusing initially on a limited number of claimants should also provide reassurance to those who may be under the misleading impression that change will happen overnight. It is not.

As I spent nearly all of my working life in the charity sector before I entered your Lordships’ House, I have seen first-hand the excellent work that it does. I was therefore pleased to learn that the DWP is going to fund Citizens Advice to provide universal support to help those claimants who find the transition to UC challenging—for example, if they struggle to use online services. This is an excellent idea, and I encourage my noble friend and her fellow Ministers at the DWP to explore how other charities with a recognisable, trusted brand can help mitigate disabled people’s concerns about transition—for example, by contacting those who have not responded to successive communications, whether written or by phone, from the DWP.

I shall finish with a general point, which I have arrived at having listened to various contributions from the Benches opposite which I found really depressing because they were made in a vacuum of ideological deficit denial and a total inability to accept responsibility for the high level of debt that the profligacy of Gordon Brown visited upon this country as an enduring legacy of his spending. I simply say that that would become so much worse under the Marxist McDonnell Chancellor if Labour were to win the next general election.

My final point is that a failure to tackle that and to reduce the deficit poses the single greatest threat to disabled people’s security. When the welfare system becomes unsustainable, those who need the most help are the most vulnerable. Disabled people like me do not have the most to gain from reckless debt-creating spending. We have the most to lose.

Disabled People

Lord Shinkwin Excerpts

Thursday 28th June 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Shinkwin (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Thomas of Winchester, for securing this debate and I look forward to the right reverend Prelate’s contribution.

At a time when everyone has had to tighten their belt to get the British economy back on its feet, it is important to acknowledge the immense generosity of the Great British taxpayer in helping disabled people like me to face the challenges that go with living with a disability. The latest data from the independent OECD shows that the UK’s public spending on disability and incapacity is the second highest in the G7 at 2% of GDP—a record £54 billion.

But if our message to taxpayers is “Thank you”, what might taxpayers’ message be to Government? I can hazard a guess: “Give us value for our money”. For me, that means honouring the promise of the Disability Discrimination Act in time for its 25th anniversary in 2020. We on these Benches claim to be the party of business, so let us enforce the DDA and ensure that the immense market opportunities of tapping the purple pound—disabled people’s spending power—are realised. Let us shift the dynamics of the disability debate and break the unsustainable cycle of dependency. To echo the noble Baroness, Lady Thomas of Winchester, and my noble friend Lord Holmes of Richmond, let us optimise opportunity and help talented disabled graduates to emulate the success of their BAME and women counterparts by realising their potential in corporate boardrooms up and down the country.

What, then, is the message to disabled people about the challenges we face in 2018? Of course, every Government could spend more on benefits but that is by no means the biggest challenge we face. I realised that in the Republic of Ireland last month, I saw it in Argentina earlier this month and again on the Isle of Man only yesterday. In all three, the conspiracy of silence while majority votes were cast to make it easier for non-disabled people to terminate our existence before birth was shocking. So I say to colleagues, especially those with responsibility for women and equalities issues: do not patronise us by making it easier for non-disabled people to kill us simply for the crime of being diagnosed with a disability before birth, and then claiming it is all about equality. If equality has become so distorted that it now justifies a stronger group of human beings condemning another, weaker group to death for disability, right up to birth, we really are in trouble. I believe that this distortion of equality is the single biggest challenge we face because the statistics show that our very survival is under threat.

In conclusion, I ask my noble friend to convey to the Prime Minister and her ministerial colleagues that the Government are right to insist on devolution in Northern Ireland being respected because no human being is ever less human or less equal for being disabled—at any stage of their existence.

Family Relationships (Impact Assessment and Targets) Bill [HL]

Lord Shinkwin Excerpts

2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Friday 23rd February 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Shinkwin (Con)]

My Lords, I, too, congratulate my noble friend Lord Farmer on securing a Second Reading of his Bill. The subject matter could not be more important, for the simple reason that without families there is no sustainable society. A breakdown in family relationships leads to, as some would say we are witnessing, a breakdown in society with massive, indeed unsustainable, financial, social and painful human costs. My noble friend Lord Farmer has already outlined this and the noble Baroness, Lady Massey of Darwen, and the noble Lord, Lord Kirkwood of Kirkhope, alluded to it.

As I said in my noble friend’s debate on strengthening families in November 2017, I was delighted to be a co-signatory to A Manifesto to Strengthen Families. The measures that it advocates, of which this is one, are not just eminently sensible but essential. The family impact assessment is particularly important because, as has been explained, the voluntary nature of the family test and the rather haphazard way in which it has been applied suggest that it is unlikely to achieve the cultural change in policy-making that was originally intended.

That is surely the key point. We are embarking on positive, beneficial and non-judgmental cultural change, which recognises the family’s pivotal role as the foundation of a stable society. I stress that I completely accept the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Massey of Darwen, that families now come in all shapes and sizes. That is covered by paragraphs (a) to (g) of Clause 1(5) and by Clause 4. For the reasons set out, this Bill provides a crucial cornerstone to that process of cultural change because, without family impact assessments being conducted consistently across central and local government, establishing a cross-government family strategy, which is fundamental to strengthening families, is just not possible

The question is not so much why we should have family impact assessments on a statutory basis. It is, surely, why not? Indeed, how can we make measurable, cost-effective and sustainable progress towards stronger families and the stability that they bring without the measures proposed in the Bill? We only have to look at, for example, the mental health costs to teenagers of family breakdown to see that the growing instability caused by a systemic devaluation of the family comes at an extortionate price. The figure of £51 billion was mentioned by an earlier contributor to this debate. On the other hand, reversing that trend by strengthening families would be an extraordinary prize, which I thank my noble friend Lord Farmer for pursuing through his Bill. We have nothing to lose and everything to gain. The Bill deserves our wholehearted support.

Universal Credit

Lord Shinkwin Excerpts

Wednesday 21st December 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Shinkwin (Con)]

My Lords, I join in thanking my noble friend Lord Farmer for securing this timely debate. For me, perhaps the two greatest strengths of universal credit are its simplicity and flexibility, which my noble friend Lady Jenkin has already identified. Indeed, I have been struck by how much those two characteristics have been singled out for praise—for example, by the recruitment agency Blue Arrow and by individuals whose testimonies to the Department for Work and Pensions I have read.

It occurs to me that Parliament is often seen as a place where we tear bits out of each other, although, of course, never in your Lordships’ House. I wonder, therefore, whether it is all the more important that we give credit where it is due. By credit, I do not mean just the approximately 1,800 Parliamentary Questions that the House of Lords Library estimates my noble friend has answered, or the approximately 400 Statements that he has made, or even the countless hours he has enjoyed at the Dispatch Box during his time as a Minister since 2010. No, what I mean by credit is his record as a proud Conservative social reformer, who, along with Iain Duncan Smith, has translated the vision that work must always pay into reality, and as someone who has recognised that identifying the political imperative on its own is not enough. That is because the political impetus is also essential—the impetus that translates a vision from recognising that a policy is necessary to seeing it being implemented and rolled out. That requires political will. Therefore, there is much that we can, and should, learn from my noble friend because the Freud model of government so obviously works. Change is actually happening, and in the face of systemic inertia and, I suspect, sometimes denial that change is even necessary. That is surely a remarkable achievement.

I believe that just as the Disability Discrimination Act was the Conservatives’ greatest social reform of the 20th century, so universal credit will come to be seen as one of the Conservatives’ greatest social reforms of the 21st century. We should take pride in both and look to draw on my noble friend the Minister’s example of applying the political will and the drive so essential to implementing and rolling out our political and social reforms, whether that be universal credit, or, indeed, the Disability Discrimination Act—both matter. We should also appreciate that only when we roll them out and they are fully implemented can their benefits be fully realised. Surely that will represent a fitting and lasting tribute to my noble friend the Minister.

Poverty

Lord Shinkwin Excerpts

Wednesday 29th June 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Freud]

There is a huge amount of work being done on the educational side, which is where this has to start—but clearly there is an element of remediation and later support beyond the school years. That is where, for instance, the apprenticeship programme, which is growing quite steeply, is really important.

[Lord Shinkwin (Con)]

My Lords, as someone who welcomes the Prime Minister’s commitment to social justice and improving life chances, and believes that he will leave a significant legacy to his successor, may I ask my noble friend what plans the Government have to help the most needy and vulnerable benefit recipients in future?

[Lord Freud]

One of the most valuable things I got from this House was during the passage of the Welfare Reform Act 2012, when we debated what to do for the most vulnerable in the context of UC. That led to the creation of universal support, whereby we join up with local authorities to try to provide services that join together. We have done that now for two of the barriers people face, in budgeting and in digital competence, and we are now exploring how to expand that approach, which shares information, data and support in relation to other barriers. We have some trials going on at the moment, one in Croydon and one in the London Bridge area, on how to do that most effectively.

Personal Independence Payment

Lord Shinkwin Excerpts

Monday 6th June 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Altmann]

The noble Baroness obviously makes a very well-informed point. I can assure the House that the Minister for Disabled People is actively working on this; we want to get it right. We are trying to improve the original assessment. Obviously it is in everyone’s interest to get the correct decision as early as possible, so we are now giving assessors an extra 10 working days to help applicants gather their information. Many appeals succeed because they produce new evidence that was not available at the time of the original assessment.

[Lord Shinkwin (Con)]

My Lords, I welcome the fact that the Government recently facilitated a meeting between Atos, Capita and the Royal British Legion, where I was privileged to work as its head of public affairs. Will my noble friend join me in congratulating Charles Byrne on his appointment as the new director-general of the legion? Will she undertake to explore how more disabled people, such as injured veterans, might be encouraged to apply to be PIP assessors?

[Baroness Altmann]

I certainly join my noble friend in congratulating the new director-general. I have already been working on his excellent suggestion and have made inquiries about how many of our assessors are disabled. I am assured that applications for assessors are open to people regardless of disability. Indeed, we would welcome disabled people applying to be assessors as they would be very well placed to make these assessments, but we do not have the figures at the moment to be able to report to the House how many of our assessors are disabled.