Supporting Disabled people in the screen industries

At the start of 2025, BAFTA brought together a panel of industry experts to discuss how to help remove barriers facing Disabled people on set. Now as we head towards the end of the year we catch up with panellist Heloise (Eli) Beaton, project lead at the TV Access Project (TAP), to hear about the progress the industry is making and new resources that are available…

A woman and a man sat side by side in front of a red wall. The woman, a motability scooter user, is wearing a lime green outfit and the man, a wheelchair user, is wearing a brown tracksuit.

How do you think representation of Disabled people has changed in 2025?

“It’s a hard one to quantify but the best measure is the Creative Diversity Network’s latest Diamond Report which says we have reached the target of doubling disability this year which is a huge moment. It was reviewed independently, and they’d predicted that we wouldn’t reach that until 2028. The fact that we’ve reached it several years earlier shows just how much work has gone into improving accessibility in the industry.

“It might not be purely down to more Disabled talent joining the industry but it might be more people feeling comfortable and confident in disclosing and identifying as Disabled. Which is a huge achievement as well because, while it’s vital that we have better representation in numbers, actually we also need to recognise and prioritise the experience people have on productions. And whilst we might have programmes that have really high representation if they’re not having a truly inclusive experience then we’ve missed something.

“There’s still lots to be done but we are certainly moving in the right direction.”

This summer TAP launched a free employment resources hub to support Deaf, Disabled and/or Neurodivergent (DDN) talent navigate a career through the screen industries, understand their employment rights, and empower conversations about access. Can you tell us more about the aims behind this?

“I always say there is no handbook that you get as a disabled person entering the workplace on what you’re allowed to ask for and what the legal responsibilities of your employer are. You just sort of have to figure it out as you go and that’s really challenging. That’s then also really challenging for the TV industry because we might work in slightly different ways, particularly with a lot of the work being freelance, which might not have the same formality and structure as fulltime positions. That’s really where the employment resources were born from.

“The aim was to bring together every element of the employment process from job applications to interviews, to onboarding, hints and tips, and examples of how you might want to disclose when you are speaking to your employer as that’s a very personal choice and there is no one set way of doing things.

“And as Jack Thorne eloquently said at the launch event for these resources: ‘We want a situation in which everything that has been troubling us, everything we have to fight on a daily basis disappears. At TAP we are huge believers in the social model of disability, that disability comes not from personal impairments but from a society that is inaccessible both in space and crucially in attitude. And if TV doesn’t live up to the social model it fails both the people that work in it but also it crucially fails the stories it can tell.’”

And how did these resources come together?

“The need for employment resources came out of very early conversations with Disabled talent. A pattern that we’ve seen quite consistently across all of the work we’ve been doing is just a lack of education and support for people to understand their rights as a Disabled person.

“The education piece is so important because it’s creating that culture change. Anecdotally, we’ve heard some really wonderful stories of people having amazing experiences on productions that are also reflected in the brilliant onscreen representation we’ve had this year too. For example, Code of Silence, Reunion, and The Assembly, all very consciously employ DDN talent behind the camera as well as having it onscreen, so we’re definitely seeing positive changes.

“Inclusion is everyone’s responsibility, and we can all play our part in whatever role that we do. Whether we are a runner who’s entering the industry and doing our first job, or whether we’re a commissioning editor with 30 yrs experience. We can all make really brilliant, effective and impactful small changes in the way that we work to help advocate for Disabled talent”

For those who don’t know, can you tell us the role BAFTA has played in this too…

“For each area of TAP’s work we have dedicated workstreams looking at solutions to remove a specific barrier. In this instance the workstream is dedicated to talent progression and retention so we have representatives from all of our member partners as well as Disabled freelancers involved. This enables us to have lived experience and professional experience across the board within the TV industry.

“BAFTA are a really important partner and have been involved in the work of TAP from its inception so it’s really brilliant to have BAFTA’s voice in all that we do. They have also been embedding all of these principles into their own talent initiatives and the support they provide to the Disabled talent they work with. Hopefully the members can utilise the resources that we produce too.

“The really wonderful thing about TAP is how collaborative we’ve been and that we have organisations across the industry including BAFTA pushing forward the work that we do, and we saw that in the production of these employment resources..”

BAFTA is also proud to have their Disability Advisory Group. A sub-committee of the Learning, Inclusion and Talent Committee and includes a range of Deaf, Disabled and/or Neurodivergent practitioners and representative from networks from across the industries.