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The Minister for Disabled People has appointed four new Disability and Access Ambassadors for the tourism, technology, sports and recruitment industries.
Disability and Access Ambassadors are senior business leader, they work with the government to drive improvements in their sectors for disabled people, helping to ensure businesses are doing all they can to support disabled customers and clients. The roles are voluntary and are changed every three years.
New ambassadors are appointed in the summer and at the start of the year, with the Ambassadors for tourism, technology, sports and recruitment being announced in January.
Chloe Smith MP, the Minister for Disabled People, Health and Work, said: “I am delighted to be working with this impressive group of senior leaders, who generously give their time to help us in our aim to improve the lives of disabled people across all sectors of society. Their experience and insight in their respective industries provides a unique resource that will help us to make the changes disabled people need, to increase access across a wide range of private sector industries.”
The new ambassador for tourism is Ross Calladine, who is the Head of Business Support at VisitEngland. In this role he has worked as their in-house accessibility specialist, developing and delivering initiatives that engage tourism businesses and destinations in accessible tourism.
He led the development of England’s first Accessible Tourism Action Plan and produced a large number of guidance and support tools for the industry. Ross founded England’s Inclusive Tourism Action Group and has spent 13 years working with disabled people making him a respected expert all over the world.
Ross has been joined by Tom Hollingsworth OBE, the CEO of Sport England who is the new Ambassador for Sports and Physical Activity. Previously, he was the Chief Executive of the British Paralympic Association for seven years and led the team into 4 Paralympic Games.
Hector Minto is the new Ambassador for Technology and web accessibility having dedicated his career to inclusive technology and is also the Director of Accessibility Evangelism at Microsoft. The final Ambassador announced in this round was Kate Headley, co founder of the Clear Company who is the new Ambassador for Recruitment. In addition to this role, she is also a government advisor on disability and diversity and serves on the external panel of experts to the Cabinet Office. She is a founder partner of the government’s Disability Confident Campaign.
