We Want to Hear Your Access to Work Story
January 13, 2026
Has Access to Work helped you or let you down? Your experience matters and can help make real change in the North East. Deadline: 23rd Feb
Has Access to Work helped you or let you down? Your experience matters and can help make real change in the North East. Deadline: 23rd Feb
Celebrate Wins & Keep Fighting: Ramping Up Rights Ignites Hope!
Rachel Charlton-Dailey’s “Ramping Up Rights” book launch in Stockton was powerful! We celebrated a huge win: community action forced the government to change harmful welfare plans. This proves together we win! This is important even if we’ve not got everything we want!
The book shows how understanding our history helps fight today’s battles. We heard moving stories, like Joy Dove’s fight for justice after losing her daughter Jodey to cruel benefit cuts. Sadly, while Joy spoke, her MP voted for more cuts.
The fight isn’t over. We need everyone! Join Difference North East to build community power, sustain the fight, and win more rights for disabled people. Get the book!
The government’s Pathways to Work plan ignores disabled people. It makes big changes to benefits (like PIP and Universal Credit) but won’t let people have a proper say.
❌ Key problems:
There were no meetings in the North East (only Leeds/Glasgow).
Online sessions filled up fast.
Easy Read versions came 3 weeks late.
💬 Disabled people say:
“I needed work adjustments but was ignored.”
“Train stations still aren’t accessible.”
“They said my cerebral palsy ‘wasn’t disabled enough’.”
We demand:
Stop the changes.
Listen to disabled voices first.
Fix the unfair system.
Act now! Sign our campaign or email hello@differencenortheast.org.uk.
“Nothing about us without us!”
Rose Powell from ‘Stop Oxevision’ tells how her group was stopped from speaking at the Lampard Inquiry on 14 May 2025. They had worked for two years to collect stories from mental health patients. They were meant to share this, but the hospital trust sent in another statement and their talk was pushed back. Rose explains why cameras in hospital bedrooms can be harmful and why public money should not be spent on unsafe tech instead of real care.
Watch Bex Bowsher, Chair of Unfolding theatre and Difference North East Development Manager, talk about the positive impact of making governance accessible.
What’s it like trying to get a job when you are Neurodivergent? This looks into the difficulties experienced by one member.
This is a review of a play written by Bex Bowsher from Difference. The play celebrates disabled women’s lives and is a fantastic show.
This looks at the reasons why disabled people can’t get work.
Hear what our members think about trying to get a house if you are disabled.
Hear about our photography project, claiming the normal, representing disabled everyday lives.