It is hard to believe that 12 months has passed since we were last making preparations for Purple Tuesday. Purple Tuesday is an annual celebration focussed on creating a positive step change improvement in the awareness of the value and needs of disabled customers. At British Land we believe that disability inclusion only works when it is part of the organisational DNA, embedded in all our business decisions.

Over the last 12 months, we have made great progress and what better time than Purple Tuesday to take a step back and recognise our achievements.

In September we were incredibly proud that British Land was awarded the ‘Disability Smart Accreditation’ from the Business Disability Forum - the first organisation within the Real Estate sector to gain this recognition. This award is only given to organisations who can demonstrate that disability inclusion is an integral part of their company culture and processes.

We have been working towards this accreditation for 2 years during this journey we have learned so much:

• We have completely rewritten our ‘Disabled Worker and Workplace Adjustments policy’ making it much easier for our people to have access to suitable adjustments and have introduced a ‘Tailor Adjustment Plan’ acting as a passport of adjustments for the individual throughout their career journey.

• Our Line Managers have been given extra training and so we now have a key group of leaders who are better equipped to create a safe environment where their team members can talk about their workplace needs and preferences. Other training includes our ‘Hidden Disability Sunflower training’ with more than 150 people working on the front line of our shopping centres and office campuses having successfully completed the course.

• We have created a customer advocacy group called ‘Access for All’ with 35 members to share knowledge and ideas to help improve customer experience, with topics such as retail accessibility, what makes an accessible workplace and digital accessibility for example. We use this forum to review the great work that is already underway at many of our places from quiet shopping mornings at Royal Victoria Place to offering Sensory Backpacks at Fort Kinnaird.

• Partnerships with organisations local to our places such as Support Dogs in Sheffield and Pursuing Independent Paths in London enable us to not only support these organisations financially through donations, but to also create opportunities for work experience and independent skills training.

All this activity is led by our staff network enaBLe, which has grown significantly since being launched in 2019. As a founding member and newly appointed Chair I am very excited about the future and the impact that our enaBLers will have on continuing to make our company an inclusive environment for all abilities.

I am grateful to have worked alongside Ginny Warr, our outgoing Chair, for the last three years. She has created a great framework and common shared values for the group. We still have much to do but we have come a long way already.