Disability at London Stock Exchange Group

London Stock Exchange today welcomes Purple to open trading, as part of the not-for-profit organisation’s national launch.

According to research carried out by Purple, almost half of UK businesses (45 per cent) are afraid to hire someone with a disability because of fears they won’t be able to do the job and concerns about making inappropriate comments or actions. From today Purple will be supporting both business and disabled people to build business confidence and understanding of the disability market, and will support more than 20,000 disabled people find permanent jobs over the next decade.

Chief Executive of Purple, Mike Adams OBE, said: “Disabled people already fall significantly behind the rest of the population when it comes to the majority of wellbeing standards. Of the UK’s 11.5 million disabled people, just 11 per cent are currently in work, compared to 80 per cent of non-disabled people.

“What our research tells us is that in fact it isn’t disability that’s the barrier to finding employment, but the worries and misconceptions of business owners themselves. This isn’t just a barrier for disabled people, but for many businesses that are missing out on valuable employee skills and talent, as well as a powerful consumer opportunity.

“That is why we were delighted when invited to open trading at London Stock Exchange, a globally recognised symbol of business and financial excellence. By being here today we are symbolically marrying business and disability in a way that has never been seen before.”

The UK disability market, or ‘Purple Pound’, is worth an estimated £212bn a year. For wider society, just a five percentage point increase in the disability employment rate would lead to an increase in GDP of £23bn by 2030.

For more information on Purple and the research findings go to www.wearepurple.org.uk