Knowledge Miles: The 695th Lord Mayor's Lectures: Disabled Entrepreneurs In London: Are They Getting A Fair Deal?
Centre for Innovation Management Research (CIMR)
High-quality research and teaching in #innovation & #entrepreneurship drawing on a variety of academic disciplines.
Presentation by Jacqueline Winstanley FRSA , Universal Inclusion and Helen Lawton Smith , Birkbeck, University of London
Disabled people account for nearly a quarter of the UK adult population. The disability employment gap (the difference in the employment rate of disabled people and people who are not disabled is nearly 28 percent) (House of Commons 2024) [1]. ?What this report did not mention is that 14% of working disabled people are self-employed.
These statistics mean that there is an opportunity in London as well as a national opportunity, for capitalising on the creativity and innovation that disabled entrepreneurs offer to society and increasing the perception of that opportunity. However, whilst London has a relatively low percentage of disabled people, it is also recognised as having systemic inequalities.
Against this backdrop, in this presentation we address the question, “Are disabled entrepreneurs in London getting a fair deal?”
Evidence that we use to answer the question stems from the ethical collaboration between policy, practice and academia, in particular a series of studies on the link between innovation and equality, diversity & inclusion.? Two have been funded by Innovate UK and one by the Regional Studies Association. They sit alongside work undertaken by Universal Inclusion, The Inclusive Entrepreneur Network and the work programme of the All Party Parliamentary Group for Inclusive Entrepreneurship.
The latest report is the 2023 Innovate UK / Innovation Caucus funded study, The Road to Wonder. It highlights the multiple barriers and challenges to creating innovation and enterprise faced by disabled people nationally. A London initiative would have to consider these. We recognise that barriers do not operate independently - each has an impact on the others and subject to intersectionality. Access to funding is a challenge at the best of times for any entrepreneur, but when you are disabled, female and have long-term health conditions as well and caring responsibilities, this combination makes that even harder.
Barriers include:
Equally the lack of accessible housing, transport, health and social care are major factors ensuring slow growth of innovation and enterprise created by disabled people.? Our study highlighted the ‘Pull’ factors associated with working from home.
?‘Pull’ factors included having the ability to work flexibly. Some participants spoke of how working for themself and/or working from home made it easier to manage their presenting symptoms; for example in terms of saving energy and being able to lie down if needed. As one participant explained:
“The pandemic really helped because now more companies are open to have you work from home, and because I also have chronic pain it really makes a difference because if, like, I work from home, it costs me less energy. And if I have a bad day, I can still like my brain still works. So, you can lie down with your legs up, ice pack on. But you can still work with your laptop.”
Other participants took advantage of increased remote working during the pandemic to set up their business, for example, by working from home to provide remote working administrative support to other businesses.
Using the retrofit sector as an exemplar we reflect on how London might take the lead on working towards a solution to a lack of awareness of the potential for disabled entrepreneurs and of the opportunities for innovation that they provide.? The next step would be to bring about a coherent set of interventions leading to real and sustainable change.
The London focus came from a UKRI initiative: ?Local Policy Innovation Partnerships (LPIPs) for which regional consortia bid for funding to enable them to address social, community, economic and environmental priorities that contribute towards inclusive sustainable economic growth. This was led by the London Research and Policy Partnership (LRaPP)[2].
Jacqueline and I became part of that bid. We brought into the retrofit proposal how to include disabled entrepreneurs and bring together unconnected organisations who had or would have an interest in innovation and enterprise created by disabled people. Funding for Phase 1 (2023) was for a scoping project leading to a bid for Phase 2 funding (for which our bid was unsuccessful).
?The issue we were concerned with was that women, ethnic minorities and disabled people are under-represented in the exiting retrofit workforce (WPI Economics, 2021). In particular disabled entrepreneurs are not sufficiently recognised as having potential in providing solutions to the challenge of retrofitting London.
In answer to our question, Disabled Entrepreneurs in London: Are They Getting a Fair Deal?
Our Answer is No! (Not Yet).
However, both nationally (for example by Innovate UK, and the All Party Parliamentary Groups) and in London there is increasing recognition of the societal and economic gains from better resourced disabled entrepreneurs and consequently of their importance in the London economy.?
For example the ?London Lord Mayor’s Appeal for the power of inclusion is aligned with the Sustainable Development Goals 8 (decent work and economic growth) & 10 (reduced inequalities) (see The Lord Mayor's Appeal | A Better City for All | The Lord Mayor's Appeal 2022/2023 (thelordmayorsappeal.org).
We propose a paradigm shift from seeing disabled people as tax / health and social care burdens where policy responses rarely look beyond welfare, instead highlighting their potential as leaders in the creation of innovation and enterprise. We suggest that London could take the lead in:
?·?????? Changing perception
??????? Cross sector ethical collaboration and effective resourcing
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??????? Reducing the disability employment and pay gap
??????? Breaking the cycle of poverty
??????? Placing disabled people in leadership roles
??????? Increasing inclusive economic growth
??????? Improving the health and wellbeing of disabled entrepreneurs.
?Our key recommendation is that London should appoint a neutral body to undertake ethical collaboration with disabled people and other key players in the design of policies and programmes to address the barriers identified in the report, building on best practices and evaluation in the UK and internationally.
?For Jacqueline and me, our next steps in research are to investigate the economic and societal benefits of innovation by disabled entrepreneurs, including the impact on health and well-being. This will be conducted by the new Centre of Excellence for Inclusive Entrepreneurship at CIMR bbk.ac.uk/cimr.
The link to the recording can be found here: https://www.greshamsociety.org/webinar/12029/
References:
HLS and JW August 27 2024