Workforce disability equality standard (WDES) annual report 2024

Contents

1. Executive summary
2. Background
3. Workforce disability equality standard (WDES) in 2023 and 2024
4. Consultation
5. Conclusion
6. Recommendations
7. Workforce disability equality standard data table

1 Executive summary

This report provides an overview of the work required for Rotherham, Doncaster and South Humber NHS Foundation Trust (RDaSH) to meet its contractual requirements of the workforce disability equality standard (WDES) by promoting equality, diversity and inclusion for its Disabled colleagues, gathering data from the electronic staff records (ESR), recruitment, disciplinary and training datasets and the national staff survey as of 31 March 2024.

The annual submission of our workforce data and staff survey results is summarised below, and the full data set in appendix 1. The data was submitted by the national deadline of 31 May 2024 via NHS England’s national reporting portal.

The data and statistics used in this report reflect workforce metrics, NHS staff survey metrics and a board representation metric for the past three years.

It is evident from the data collected that there are disparities in the experience of disabled colleagues compared with non-disabled colleagues.

Comparing the 2024 WDES data against the data collected in 2023 has highlighted several areas which have improved and likewise deterioration in several areas which are a cause for concern which indicates that we still have a long way to go to eliminate the stigma and improve and enhance the experience of disabled colleagues within our workforce.

The Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) team and Disability and Wellbeing Network (DAWN) will co-produce an action plan that addresses areas of the WDES that require further improvement and submit to CLE and the Board of Directors for approval and support for implementation.

2 Background

This report states the process followed for data collection, analysis, and co-production of the action plan and highlights the areas of focus for 2024. This will enable RDaSH to demonstrate progress against the metrics of disability equality and introduce new measures and practices, which will help, improve workforce disability equality.

The WDES has been designed to improve the representation and experience of our disabled colleagues and colleagues who have a long-term health condition.

Since 2013, the earliest comparable year, up to the start of the pandemic (March 2020) the general trend in disability employment had been positive. There had been strong growth in the number and rate of disabled people in employment and a narrowing of the gap between the rate of disabled and non-disabled people in employment (the disability employment gap).

There were 10.21 million people of working age (16 to 64) who reported that they were disabled in October to December 2023, which is 24% of the working-age population. This is an increase of 459,000 from the year before. There were 5.53 million working-age disabled people in employment in October to December 2023, an increase of 338,000 from October to December 2022. The employment rate of disabled people was 54.2%, up from 52.7% a year previously. The employment rate for people who are not disabled was 82.0%.

The NHS constitution has a specific section that refers to the rights of colleagues. It recognised that it is the commitment, professionalism and dedication of colleagues working for the benefit of the people the NHS serves which really make the difference. High quality care requires high quality workplaces, with commissioners and providers aiming to be employers of choice. The workforce disability equality standard (WDES) is important because research shows that a motivated, included and valued workforce helps to deliver high quality patient care, increased patient satisfaction and improved patient safety.

The implementation of the WDES enables the trust to better understand the experiences of its disabled colleagues. It supports positive change for existing employees and enables a more inclusive environment for disabled people working in the trust, it also allows us to identify good practice and compare performance regionally and by type of trust.

Over the past three years it has been exceedingly challenging for all colleagues having to work through the pandemic and adjusting to new ways of working and finding a new normal post pandemic. Acknowledging this is important to fully appreciate the hard work and dedication of those committed to drive this agenda forward, which has influenced the improvements made during unusual and challenging circumstances. Whilst there are still areas which the Trust need to focus on it is now more than ever that we need to embed disability equality into the trust to support our colleagues who are disproportionately impacted by the challenges post pandemic.

3 Workforce disability equality standard (WDES) in 2023 and 2024

Please note, for all metrics we have highlighted both positive and negative trends that are statistically significant plus or minus 0.3%, anything below 0.3% is considered static, denoted by positive, negative, and static respectively.

3.1 Metric 1, percentage of disabled colleagues in the workforce broken down by agenda for change (AFC) band

• There has been an overall improvement in bands 1 to 8 in non-clinical and clinical colleagues declaring that they have a disability or long-term health condition, however, we have a significant deterioration in bands 8c to 9 and very senior managers.
• It is evident when comparing the percentage declared in our staff survey results that further work in educating our workforce and reducing the stigma around declaration of health conditions. This will be readdressed in the workforce disability equality standard (WDES) action plan for 2024 to 2025.

3.2 Metric 2

• Although this metric shows a deterioration again, as of 31 March 2024, 149 disabled applicants were shortlisted and 45 appointed compared to 149 being shortlisted in 2023 and 61 applicants being appointed. Overall non-disabled shortlisted applicants as of 31 March 2024 was 1316 (including not declared) with 450 being appointed.
• Work has commenced with the People Experience team to promote RDaSH as a preferred employer for applicants with a disability or long-term health conditions
• The equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) advisor is currently developing a toolkit and training package for colleagues and managers to promote awareness and break down barriers to inclusive recruitment.

3.3 Metric 3

• A figure above 1.00 indicates that disabled colleagues are more likely than non-disabled staff to enter for formal capability process.

3.4 Metric 4, colleagues feeling harassed, bullied, or abused in the last 12 months

• Metric 4a shows another year on year improvement, the experience of both disabled and non-disabled colleague’s remains high and is an area of concern that will be carried forward in the WDES action plan for 2024 to 2025.

• Metric 4b reflects a significant decrease in colleagues experiencing harassment or bullying from managers.

• Metric 4c: This metric has seen a 3.8% increase from the previous year and compared to the same reported experience of non-disabled colleagues is a cause for concern, despite training and awareness session’s being put in place further intensive cultural work needs to be undertaken in this area.

• Metric 4d shows a significant decrease in reporting for disabled colleagues, it is important to note that non-disabled colleagues reporting has yet again deteriorated which is a cause for concern, work is ongoing to improve reporting procedures and will be included in the WDES action plan 2024 to 2025 to monitor progress.

3.5 Metric 5

• Both disabled and non-disabled figures have seen a significant decline in comparison the 2023 staff survey results, the gap between disabled and non-disabled colleagues remains quite high.
• This will continue to be monitored through the WDES action plan 2024 to 2025 and through the work the Organisational Development team are conducting with talent management.

3.6 Metric 6

• There has been a 4% increase in the staff survey results for presenteeism in this year’s results, the gap has widened with non-disabled colleagues who have remained stagnant this year. This is an ongoing action in the WDES action plan and still requires further action to close the gap and will be carried forward into the 2024 to 2025 action plan.

3.7 Metric 7

• Overall, there has been a negative decrease in this metric for both disabled and non-disabled colleagues, the Disability and Wellbeing Network Chair and members are taking this action forward as part of their objectives to raise awareness of what RDaSH has to offer.

3.8 Metric 8

• This is a positive trend and has increased year on year, we will continue to raise awareness and strive to eliminate any barriers to obtaining reasonable adjustments. It is envisaged with the implementation of the disability toolkit and training and access to the reasonable adjustments centralised budget that we can close this gap.

3.9 Metric 9

• This trend has increased for disabled colleagues with a slight increase for non-disabled colleagues.
• The findings from the colleague’s survey whilst showing improvements for disabled colleagues in some areas, shows our disabled colleagues are having a less positive experience than non-disabled colleagues. We are committed to working with our disability and wellbeing network to address areas of difference and work together to bring about improvements.

3.10 Metric 10

• Whilst we have seen a significant increase in declaration from the board membership it should be noted that 33% are still reflecting as ‘unknown or not declared’.

4 Consultation

The outcome of the data analysis has been discussed at the people and teams meeting and the inclusion networks to obtain an initial observation regarding the changes in the data.

5 Conclusion

There has been improvement across most of the metrics, which reflects the work which has been undertaken within the trust to improve the experience of disabled colleagues.

The trust has made great strides in creating a culture where disability equality matters and is to be commended in seeing a change in many of the metrics which equate to more positive experiences for colleagues. It is recognised that more work needs to take place at a managerial level.

The total headcount from ESR reflects that 324 colleagues have declared that they have a disability or long-term health condition on comparison with the respondents from the staff survey for the staff engagement score 639 colleagues from our organisation responded to the disability element. Further intensive work is required to ensure that our workforce have the awareness of why it is in their best interest to declare their status on ESR.

The metrics which have seen a deterioration will be the focus of the co-produced action plan.

The trust will continue to ensure that the board’s recruitment process is inclusive to ensure diversity across all the protected characteristics.

A further conversation will take place to look at a senior leader’s, video log promoting and role modelling self-declaration to encourage other colleagues to do so.

Discussions have already commenced with the DAWN group regarding presenteeism so we can improve experiences and address metric 6.

6 Recommendations

The Senior Leadership team and board are asked to review the data and sign off the information presented prior to the required publication on the trust’s website by 30 September 2024.

The forthcoming action plan needs to be agreed and published by 31 October 2024.

7 Workforce disability equality standard (WDES) data table

7.1 Workforce disability equality standard (WDES) metric 1

Staff in agenda for change (AFC) pay bands or medical and dental subgroups and very senior managers (including executive board members) compared with the percentage of staff in the overall workforce.

7.2 Workforce disability equality standard (WDES) metric 2

7.3 Workforce disability equality standard (WDES) metric 3

7.4 Workforce disability equality standard (WDES) metric 4

7.4.1 Workforce disability equality standard (WDES) metric 4a

7.4.2 Workforce disability equality standard (WDES) metric 4b

7.4.3 Workforce disability equality standard (WDES) metric 4c

7.4.4 Workforce disability equality standard (WDES) metric 4d

7.5 Workforce disability equality standard (WDES) metric 5

7.6 Workforce disability equality standard (WDES) metric 6

7.7 Workforce disability equality standard (WDES) metric 7

7.8 Workforce disability equality standard (WDES) metric 8

7.9 Workforce disability equality standard (WDES) metric 9

7.10 Workforce disability equality standard (WDES) metric 10

 

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Document control

• Author: Amanda Ambler.
• Role: Equality, diversity and inclusion advisor.

Page last reviewed: April 15, 2025
Next review due: April 15, 2026

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