The UK Disability Confident scheme is a government initiative designed to help employers recruit, retain, and develop disabled people and those with health conditions in the workplace. It provides a framework and guidance for organisations to create inclusive and accessible working environments, challenge negative attitudes, and ensure fair treatment in recruitment and employment practices.
At Leek Building Society, we’re committed to creating a diverse and balanced workforce because we know different people bring different ideas, skills and perspectives.
We’re better equipped to put our members first if we have a diverse workforce of talented people that’s representative of the communities we live and work in. We want everyone who works for us to feel engaged, valued and respected and to experience that their potential is not in any way limited by their background, gender, age, race, disability, religion or sexual identity.
We became Disability Confident Committed in October 2022, and a Disability Confident Employer in May 2023, with strong ambitions to be a Disability Confident Leader in 2025.
Under the framework, employers are encouraged to share details of how many colleague who report having a disability or healthy condition, as well as the practices taking place to support colleague wellbeing.
The framework is aimed at larger employers (250 colleague or more), but as an aspiring Disability Confident Leader, we are choosing to publish our information annually.
We challenge ourselves to continually improve our employee proposition, and our practices to become even more inclusive.
A few examples of this are:
Our data for this annual report as at August 2025 is:
We are deeply committed to equality, and value inclusion and diversity as being an integral part of our strategy for the future.
That strategy includes initiatives to enhance our training regarding inclusivity for all colleagues, and delivering a survey that considers areas around wellbeing and inclusion, listening to our colleagues, and taking action if we need to make changes.
We will continue to ensure that our recruitment and selection processes are inclusive, and actively promote flexible working within our Society – something that many of our colleagues do. This has been enhanced through the offer of hybrid working for all of our non-branch employees. We also robustly support the physical and mental health and wellbeing of our colleagues – something that was recognised by the CIPD within their prestigious awards in 2023, and again in the Top 50 Inspiring Workplaces awards 2024.
We will continue to put the diversity of people within our teams at the heart of our business strategy.
