JOBS
How people with learning disabilities are overcoming stigmas to help the NHS recruitment crisis
If you’re labelled as having a learning disability or autism, the low expectations others place on you can encourage low expectations of yourself. It sounds harsh, but it’s the lived experience of many people in the UK who are exploited or ignored.
Workplaces are desperate for more hands on deck. Britain is facing a recruitment crisis, with around 1.2 million vacancies, and economists warn it’s slowing down growth when the country needs to bounce back from Brexit and the pandemic.
At the same time, just 4.8 per cent of adults with a learning disability are in paid employment.
Many more end up taking part-time or voluntary roles and this is a massive waste of talent, said David Bridges, programme manager of the Devon-based Project Search.
“I’ve been working with people with special needs for 25 years and the progress people are making on this course is eye-watering,” said Bridges, of the programme putting people with significant learning disabilities in full-time paid work in the NHS, and filling some vital vacancies.
The participants, who are usually aged between 18 and 24, are given two weeks of intense training and by the end of the course, support workers like Bridges choose a first placement for each person based on their skills and interests.
“It’s a hard transition from school into a pretty serious workplace environment,” said Bridges, so they do everything in their power to make that first placement a success.
Nineteen-year-old Jasmine Henderson is a recent graduate from the project and now works in the North
