Sarah Hall

I could not agree more. I will come on to some of the work that GMB, Unison and USDAW—the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers— are doing in this area. The barriers that I mentioned are what disable people. Too often, neurodiversity is still approached through the medical model of disability, focusing on what is wrong with the individual, what they cannot do or how they fall short of an assumed standard. That approach creates low expectations and leaves people feeling pitied, patronised or quietly excluded. The social model of disability offers a different and more honest lens. It recognises that people are disabled not by their impairment or condition, but by barriers created by society: inflexible systems, poor understanding and rigid attitudes. Let me ground that in a practical example. An autistic retail worker struggled with constant changes to their working hours not because they did not want to work, but because of unpredictability, increased anxiety and sensory overload. What they needed was a stable shift pattern. Predictability gave them control and made work possible. Under the medical model, the problem would have been framed as the worker. Under the social model, the problem was the demand for unlimited flexibility. When the employer agreed to a stable shift pattern, it meant the difference between staying in work or having to give up their job altogether. There was no grand intervention, just a reasonable adjustment.