‘I was desperate for a job, the same as everyone else. I couldn’t be happier now’
easy and his role enables him to use his marketing skills to aid clients.
“It has been a long, hard road with many disappointments along the way,” he says. “This was the first proper opportunity I got and I seized it. I was desperate for a job, the same as everyone else. I couldn’t be happier now.”
It’s a struggle that George Fielding would recognise. He is 24, has cerebral palsy and tried to get financial support from the Government-run Access to Work scheme specifically set up to help disabled people in employment.
“I’ve tried three times to get funding but have given up each time,” he says, citing the two-week deadline for paperwork as being too tight.
GEORGE is charity liaison manager for the recently launched Valorum Foundation that will build and position care homes as skilled community hubs for its residents.
His role involves meeting partners, writing bids and ensuring activities are right for beneficiaries.
“My issue has been that work has taken over and prioritising the support for myself has fallen down my to-do list,” he says.
“I also find it a challenge identifying what funding is available, how to get it and how to efficiently explain what
I need support with.”
George, 24, from Manchester, says the money could mean he gets secretarial support for administration tasks.
“That funding would also help me with the cost of getting to work and the expenses involved,” he says. “And it would help me to identify what it is I struggle with and what can be done better.”
George may be only 24 but he’s already met former prime minister David Cameron, given speeches to audiences of thousands, advised the Government on improving transport for wheelchair users and been awarded a British Empire Media.
He received a wheelchair from children’s disability charity WhizzKidz when he was young and developed life skills at its social clubs helping him to prepare for the world of employment.
“Work has been a rewarding process for me in the sense that I always wanted to get up and do it,” George says. “The rest fitted into place.”
AFTER graduating with a degree in politics, philosophy and international relations from University College London in 2017, he moved into health and social care.
His first role was as a director of Adjuvo Care, helping to deliver care and home packages for disabled people being an “expert by experience who wears my disability with pride”. George believes disabled people are “wonderfully resilient” in general, and natural problem solvers.
“When you employ somebody who is disabled, you are hiring someone who can make decisions because on a day-to-day basis we aspire to have control and independence over our own lives,” he says.
He now wants more resources for disabled people to better present themselves to employers. “We need to grow their confidence in presenting their skills,” he says. “Employers need to invest in accessible recruitment.”