An innovator in the field of rehabilitation, Dr Stephen Duckworth talks to Kirstie Redford about the issues facing disabled people when trying to get back to work
Dr Stephen Duckworth is in the middle of writing his autobiography. Aged 42, it is 21 years since he broke his neck while studying medicine, leaving him three-quarters tetraplegic. His autobiography, due to be published next year, is called The Best Half of My Life.
'This will be exactly the mid-point in my life with regards to my accident. It will draw comparisons between my life after breaking my neck and my life before it,' says Duckworth, 'and hopefully it will be a book for disabled people to read, as well as employers and rehabilitation workers to think about. It includes some of the personal strategies I have used in order to succeed.'
To describe Duckworth's accomplishments to date as successful would be an understatement. Having achieved a string of qualifications and awards, not to mention an OBE, Duckworth is now chief executive of Disability Matters ' a company he founded and runs, which has an annual turnover of £1m.
He acts as a consultant and adviser to over 400 companies, Government departments, local authorities and health authorities on disability, rehabilitation and employment issues. He is also happily married with four sons aged 10, nine and twins aged five.
Duckworth has not let his disability get in the way of living his life, over-coming discrimination to build on his own success. But there have been barriers to break through along the way. 'I qualified as a doctor with an MSc and a PhD and went to the local job centre to ask for advice on getting a job. They told me I was unemployable,' he says.
'That was 13 years ago. I felt I had an obvious disability, but I was also well-qualified. How could a qualified person miss out on access to the labour market? I soon realised the only way I could get a job was to start a business of my own.'
Duckworth has devoted his career to trying to educate people about employment issues for the disabled.
One of his company's main roles is working in case management, both for income protection and personal injury claimants. In the income protection arena, case managers work one on one with claimants to help them fulfil their aspirations and move them back to work.
Rehabilitation is a subject where there seems to be more talk than action from the insurance industry. Although rehabilitation services have been proven to get claimants back to work quicker, while saving insurers and employers money, few insurers have fully embraced it. And according to Duckworth, the Government is also failing to prioritise it.
'I would like to think it is the Government's responsibility, but I do not think it has the commitment. It will always pass the buck regarding which department rehabilitation sits in. Work and Pensions is a logical place ' but when I visited Nick Brown, the Minister for Work and Pensions, he clearly stated it belongs with the Department of Health. If you speak to the Department of Health, it will say it is a Work and Pensions issue.'
With the Government failing to take full responsibility to ensure people are getting access to rehabilitation, Duckworth says the solution has to lie with individuals taking out the right protection. This also relies on insurers providing the right services.
'Insurers will have to commit to rehabilitation. They will do this if they see two things. First, an improvement in the policyholder's quality of life ' differentiating the provider's services from its competitors. Second, a reduction in the reserve it has to put aside for that particular client,' he says.
Through educating employers and providing case management for insurers, Duckworth's business is trying to make access to the right rehabilitation easier. This is helping insurers reduce claim periods and getting claimants back to work. However, the hardest part of the battle is often motivating disabled people to get back to work.
'I used to think most problems disabled people faced were caused by the attitude of society, placing lack of value of them, as had happened to me. But having worked with disabled people I realised their own attitudes can hold them back as well. You need to work with removing the external barriers society sets up, but also the internal barriers people put up against their own potential, self-esteem and resilience. Rehabilitation is not something you do to a person, it is something the individual has to be engaged in,' he says.
The Rehabilitation Code of Best Practice, which is supported by the ABI, has been under review. During the consultation period, which finished in September, Duckworth took the opportunity to air his views on how the industry currently deals with rehabilitation issues.
'People providing rehabilitation services are required to be financially independent of insurance companies and there are lot of providers who have a questionable relationship ' to put it kindly ' with the insurance companies,' he says, 'that section of the Code needs to be beefed up because to me, independence is critical. The individual providing the rehabilitation services should only have one person's interests at heart ' the claimant. If they are at the beck and call of the insurer because that is the way the business has been set up, the other party may not engage in the rehabilitation process, which is crucial to its success.'
Duckworth has certainly accomplished a great deal in his career to date and is considered a great innovator in the field of rehabilitation and employment.
His expertise has led to his role as adviser to various parliamentary ministers, the Cabinet Secretary and the Prince of Wales. Despite such prestigious posts, it is giving hands-on help to disabled people that Duckworth has found to be the most satisfying element to date.
'I have a lot of high level contact, but it is not that. It is the programme we ran for over three years with long-term unemployed disabled people. This was one-on-one work, training and motivating people who had been on Incapacity Benefit, or were income protection claimants for years ' to try and get them back to work. These people had had a tough life and this programme was extremely rewarding,' he says.
As for the future, Duckworth has no plans to slow down. In addition to publishing his autobiography, he has more projects in the pipeline aimed at helping educate people on disability issues. 'I have started working with a recruitment company as a disability adviser, increasing the representation of black and minority ethnic people and disabled people in senior management positions.
'I have also started after-dinner speaking. At that level I can talk to businesses about issues dear to my heart that I have experienced, but are also important to their business. It is about retaining good employees, giving disabled people an opportunity and understanding the additional skills disabled people may have by way of their determination, problem-solving skills and the ability to manage change.'
