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Workforce disability equality standard 2023/24

Date: October 2024

Review date: March 2026

Version 1

The Workforce Disability Equality Standard (WDES) was mandated via the Standard NHS Contract in April 2018: all NHS organisations are required to publish their performance data and action plans against 10 metrics of the Workforce Disability Equality Standard and make them public.

Correspondingly, this report presents the Tavistock and Portman’s 2023-24 WDES data and associated Action Plan. The 10 WDES metrics focus on workforce composition, recruitment, relative likelihood of entering the formal capability process, bullying and harassment, opportunities for career progression or promotion, feeling valued by the organisation, presenteeism, reasonable adjustments, staff engagement, and Board composition. Nationally, the WDES consistently shows that staff with Disabilities and Long-Term Health Conditions have poorer experiences at work compared to the experiences of Non-Disabled staff – see full details of the WDES indicators in the summary of findings on page 4. This report identifies where improvements have been made, where data has stagnated or deteriorated and proposes an action plan / countermeasures for ameliorating the gaps.

Key findings

WDES Metrics Workforce Disability Equality Standard Metrics based on 2023 Electronic Staff Record and HR recruitment database Trend Summary of Key Findings
Metric 1 Workforce representation (Declaration rates)

 

 Improving The number of staff who have shared their Disability or Long-Term Health Condition has increased by 3.1%.

Non-clinical cohort is representative and clinical cohort has improved by 4.2% (underrepresentation now reduced to 1%).
Metric 2 Recruitment: Relative likelihood of disabled applicants being appointed from shortlisting compared to non-disabled applicants Regressing Regressed by 0.3 but disabled applicants still more likely to be appointed from shortlisting.
Metric 3 Capability: Relative likelihood of disabled staff compared to non-disabled staff entering the formal capability process on the grounds of performance Regressing Disabled staff 1.5X more likely to enter formal capability process than non-disabled staff.
Metric 10  Board representation: percentage of the board’s membership who have declared a disability. Improving There has been gradual improvement over the last 2 years.
  WDES metrics based on 2022 NHS Staff Survey data
Metric 4a Harassment, bullying or abuse from patients, service users, their relatives or other members of the public Improving One of the Trust’s strongest scores – we are 13.3 percentage points above national average score.
Metric 4b Percentage of disabled staff compared to non-disabled staff experiencing harassment, bullying or abuse in the last 12 months from managers Improving Improved by nearly 15%, but still among lowest performers in this indicator nationally.
Metric 4c Harassment, bullying or abuse by colleagues Improving Improved by 1.9%, but still among lowest performers in this indicator nationally.
Metric 4d Reporting of harassment, bullying or abuse Improving Improved by 4.5%, but still among lowest performers in this indicator nationally.
Metric 5 Percentage of disabled staff compared to non-disabled staff believing their trust provides equal opportunities for career progression or promotion Improving Improved by 2.8%, but with a score of 27.5% we are still among lowest performers in this metric nationally.
Metric 6 Percentage of disabled staff compared to non-disabled staff saying that they have felt pressure from their manager to come to work, despite not feeling well enough to perform their duties Improving Improved by 4%, but still among lowest performers in this indicator nationally.
Metric 7 Percentage of disabled staff compared to non-disabled staff saying that they are satisfied with the extent to which their organisation values their work Improving Improved for the first time in 4 years, but still among lowest performers in this indicator nationally.
Metric 8 Percentage of disabled staff saying that their employer has made reasonable adjustment(s) to enable them to carry out their work Improving Made enormous improvement (14.2%) but the Trust score (67.7%) is still 11.6% below national average (79.3%).
Metric 9a & b The staff engagement score for disabled staff from the NHS Staff Survey, compared to non-disabled staff / Voices of disabled staff Improving Trust has made first improvement in 4 years in this metric.

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