Are physically disabled people being excluded?

Are employers focusing on neurodivergent inclusion to the exclusion of physical disabilities?

When talking to physically disabled people (my preference is to say this rather than ‘people with physical disabilities’) in law, some will say that neurodivergent (ND) people have it easier, for example pointing out ND people who call themselves ‘differently abled’ instead of disabled. Some ND people in the profession have suggested that they have it the worst compared with other disabilities, or that there is no such thing as being more severely impacted by one disability than another.

I would contend that my autism does not have the impact on my life that my girlfriend’s multiple sclerosis and neuropathic pain do on hers.

That is not to say I do not have my own serious problems. Autistic people can be prone to addiction. Last year, I was going through therapy to alleviate alcohol cravings, which I am glad to say was successful.

Everyone’s disability needs to be considered and supported individually. When The Last Leg’s Adam Hill said on the BBC’s Access All programme that fellow comedian Dan Tiernan’s dyspraxia has more of an impact on Dan than Adam’s need for a prosthetic foot, this was very specific, not a blanket statement on physical disability and neurodivergence.

Assumptions

Physically disabled people have reported discrimination on the assumption that they will not be able to contribute as many billable hours as others, despite their competence and the life-changing impact of reasonable adjustments, since organisations thrive when people are supported to do their best work. While resources such as Acas go some way to redress the balance, we have a long way to go.

When I was diagnosed with autism as a child, my mother was told ‘he will never understand how you feel’, so, yes, I believe we need to challenge assumptions about our disabilities.

Last year, the Law Society was kind enough to feature me in a Disability History Month article. I was asked what strengths I ascribed to my autism. While autistic people can be associated with attention to detail, honesty, integrity and keen memory, instead I brought up what people do not tend to associate with autism: empathy.

Stigma

With empathy in mind, let us consider how these assumptions exacerbate fear in people. Before we even begin our legal careers we have to get through the intense competition just to enter. Many ND people’s reticence to open up about their ND conditions is centred around how we may be perceived to not perform as well as a neurotypical person, with a consequent fear of being discriminated against by current and prospective employers.

This is shared by an unfortunately large majority of physically disabled people. The idea being (born of experience) that you are not safe disclosing at the recruitment stage, but only after you are hired. It cannot be right that physically disabled people feel this way.

With ND people, it is significantly less difficult to say that such omission is counterproductive. If the employer would have discriminated against you in the hiring process, then you are just making life difficult for yourself with an employer that may not support you.

Even then, at the Legal Neurodiversity Network (LNN) for example, people have been scared to follow us on LinkedIn for fear it will ‘out’ them as ND, to which we say Big Brother does not care and is not watching.

Employers

When you have employers highlighting neurodiversity initiatives, and organisations such as the LNN championing neurodivergence, some physically disabled people have been asking: ‘Where is our support?’.

This is a valid query. The 2020 Legally Disabled? report confirmed what many of us had previously known only anecdotally about disability discrimination in the profession. An employer in the law could be winning awards for diversity and inclusion, yet its disabled employees find they are discriminated against as the employer confuses ‘disability’ with ‘inability’, or has practices that directly and indirectly exclude disabled people. Organisations can vary significantly by department, even by manager. There is still work to do.

At the moment, when entering and progressing through law with a disability, neurodivergence feels more accepted by employers than physical disabilities. This is not right. All employees should be supported uniquely and individually, and we should feel confident that all employers will do this.

For employers, resources such as the LNN’s Recommendations for optimising retention and career progression for neurodivergent individuals in the legal profession guide and the Law Society’s Reasonable adjustments in organisations – guidance for best practice are readily and freely available to get started on the right track.

I cannot speak for support groups for physically disabled people, but the LNN’s objectives are to raise awareness and educate others on neurodivergence in the legal profession, provide a community for ND people in the profession together with allies, and advance the representation and inclusion of ND people in the legal sector. Many of our members are physically disabled and we do not ignore compounded needs.

UK Disability History Month, an annual event that focuses on the struggle of disabled people for equality and human rights, runs from 14 November-20 December

Martin Whitehorn is projects and campaigns co-lead at the Legal Neurodiversity Network