Delivering for Disability: Providing support in mental health services

Delivering for Disability, is a new campaign by the Royal College of Psychiatrists (RCPsych) to promote and provide guidance to support mental health employers in managing mental health staff with disabilities.

NHS staff data published earlier this year showed that mental health staff with disabilities are twice as likely to report experiencing personal discrimination from a colleague or manager compared to their non- disabled colleagues.

RCPsych President Dr Lade Smith CBE said:

“Disability discrimination comes at an immense cost to individuals, teams and ultimately impacts our ability to retain experienced professionals and thereby look after patients.  Tackling Barriers that interfere with people with disabilities being able to give their best at work is imperative to improving productivity. It will also make the NHS a more compassionate, inclusive and attractive place to work. Reasonable adjustments help staff feel valued and respected, reduce sickness absence, improve retention and foster better teamworking.”

RCPsych launched their campaign earlier this month urging employers to implement 15 actions aimed at addressing disability discrimination against NHS staff. The 15 actions are grouped into 4 headings as follows:

Organisational leadership, strategy and accountability

• Board level accountability – the guidance suggests the appointment of a board member and operational lead who will be accountable for organisational delivery of disability equity.
• Develop a workforce strategy and implementation plan
• Regular monitoring and reporting to the Board.

Organisational culture 

• Create a culture within the organisation where staff with disabilities will thrive
• Ensure leaders and managers have awareness of reasonable adjustments and mitigations
• Facilitate the development, growth and ongoing sustainability of an effective well- resourced staff network.

Addressing concerns

• Provide an independent and confidential point of contact for staff to raise concerns
• Have clear, up to date policies and procedures for staff to report disability discrimination
• Have clear, up to date policies and procedures for line managers to respond to concerns raised.

Reasonable adjustments 

• Make it clear in all adverts that reasonable adjustments will be available for application and interview processes if requested
• Provide reasonable adjustments within a defined and agreed timeframe
• Have a clear organisational policy on funding responsibility for reasonable adjustments
• Ensure adequate occupational health provision, including expertise in physical disability, mental illness related disability and neurodivergence in the workplace.
• Create a system for Reasonable Adjustment Passports for staff with disabilities; in doing so ensure that the managers are mindful of the Data Protection Regulations before handling data which is likely to fall into the category of sensitive personal data.
• Provide all staff with readily accessible information and signpost to sources of support and advice; ensure that this information is available in a format that staff with undeclared or less visible disabilities will be able to have access to it.

Many organisations will already have these recommendations in place, but this Campaign is a useful reminder to ensure that employers are compliant with their legal obligations under the Equality Act 2010. The campaign moves beyond legal compliance towards accountability and timeliness in adjustments points frequently seen in employment tribunal litigation.