UCL, home of Global Disability Innovation Hub, joins landmark light up to tackle global disability discrimination

UCL Press Release

UCL, home of Global Disability Innovation Hub, joins landmark light up to tackle global disability discrimination

UCL’s Portico building will light up purple on the 19^th August to support the International Paralympic Committee’s #WeThe15 campaign, of which the Global Disability Innovation (GDI) Hub – hosted at UCL – is a key founding partner.

The Portico joins landmark buildings lighting up in purple – the international colour of disability – around the world, including the Empire State Building in New York City, Tokyo’s Skytree and the Coliseum in Rome. UK buildings include the London Olympic Stadium, the London Eye, Piccadilly Circus and Murrayfield.

The GDI Hub, the first World Health Organisation (WHO) Collaboration Centre on Assistive Technology (based out of UCL), is playing a key role in the ten-year #WeThe15 campaign, which champions inclusion for the 15% of the global population living with disabilities. The campaign will launch on the 19^th, ahead of the Tokyo Paralympic Games, and will have dedicated slots at the opening and closing ceremonies with a call for vaccine equity for the world’s one billion disabled people, broadcast to over 200 million people across 140 nations.

The campaign is led by the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) and the International Disability Alliance (IDA), bringing together a coalition of 20 international organisations from the worlds of sport, human rights, policy, business, arts and entertainment to work with governments and the public to initiate change.

Businesses, cities and athletes will show their support for the movement by turning their social media purple and sharing the logo and campaign hashtag from the 19^th.

The theme in the first year of the campaign will be access to assistive technology (AT), building on the work done by AT2030, a UK government-funded programme led by the GDI Hub which has reached more than 21 million people with access to AT in over 35 countries with 70 partners since 2018.

Through the Collaboration Centre, the GDI Hub’s work contributes to achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) through demonstrating the human and economic value of disability innovation and AT, without which the SDGs couldn’t be achieved.

GDI Hub will also launch a product and policy accelerator to support #WeThe15 and develop ventures with a purpose of promoting the inclusion of the missing billion. From 2022 the campaign will focus on AT access for the 900m people who need it and currently don’t have it, ahead of the Winter Paralympics in Beijing.

Victoria Austin, CEO of the GDI Hub and Co-Director of the WHO Global Collaborating Centre on Assistive Technology at UCL, said: “London 2012 showed us what’s possible on disability inclusion. We set up GDI Hub to continue to drive disability innovation for a fairer world, based at UCL.

“Through our work, the value of disability innovation and assistive technology is undeniable, without which, the SDGs have no hope of being achieved, trillions of pounds will be lost to the economy and most importantly, the world’s disabled people will not achieve independence and freedom. We cannot give up, and it will be hard. But together, we can do hard things and never has it been more necessary to find our strength in each other – in all of our beautiful diversity.

“When we started, we wanted to ‘change the world a little bit’. With #WeThe15, it is time to change the world a lot.”

Professor Cathy Holloway (UCL Computer Science), Academic Director of the GDI Hub and Co-Director of the WHO Global Collaborating Centre on Assistive Technology at UCL, said:

The IPC and IDA will also team up with the Special Olympics, Invictus Games Foundation and the International Committee of Sports for the Deaf (Deaflympics) to work with athlete communities and use international sports events to further raise awareness of the issues facing people with disabilities around the world.

Other organisations supporting the campaign include the International Disability Alliance, UN Human Rights, UNESCO, the UN SDG Action Campaign and the European Commission.

The campaign is aligned with the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

Andrew Parsons, IPC President, said: “#WeThe15 aspires to be the biggest ever human rights movement for persons with disabilities and aims to put disability right at the heart of the inclusion agenda, alongside ethnicity, gender and sexual orientation.

“By uniting several leading international organisations and the world’s 1.2 billion persons with disabilities behind one common movement, we will make a tangible and well overdue difference for the planet’s largest marginalised group.”

UCL’s President & Provost, Dr Michael Spence, said: “We are privileged to host the GDI Hub at UCL and support the work it does in championing global disability innovation. The collaborative approach of #WeThe15 is key to ensuring that the one billion people living with disabilities around the world are no longer left behind, without access to assistive technology and facing discrimination. I’m delighted that we are joining the light up and I look forward to further supporting the GDI Hub in its work towards disability inclusion.”

The GDI Hub will be working with partners to call on cities internationally to meet with their disabled people's organisations and set gold, silver and bronze goals on disability inclusion before the Beijing Winter Paralympics in March 2022. GDI Hub and partners will also be calling on governments to reduce or remove tariffs on assistive technology, making it more accessible to those that need it around the world. Working with Loughborough University, Hogan Lovells and IPC, GDI Hub has brought the Paralympics to be screened for the first time in 49 countries in Africa, under the AT2030 UK Aid programme.

Please see the IPC press release for full details of the campaign and supporters.

Notes to Editors

For more information or to speak to the team involved, please contact:

Kate Corry, UCL Media Relations. T: +44 (0)20 3108 6995, E: k.corry@ucl.ac.uk

GDI Hub contact, Katherine Perry, Manager, Lead for Advocacy and Engagement E: Katherine.perry@ucl.ac.uk

#WeThe15

About GDI Hub (Global Disability Innovation Hub) - world’s first Official WHO Collaboration Centre on Assistive Technology

GDI Hub is a research and practice centre driving disability innovation for a fairer world, based out of UCL. GDI Hub was founded by top academic institutions and the team responsible for the London 2012 Paralympic Legacy programme. GDI Hub believes that disability innovation is more than a product, it’s a way of thinking. Disability innovation is part of a wider movement for justice for disabled people and the realise their human rights under the UN CRPD.

Operational in over 35 countries, GDI Hub works with more than 70 partners, delivering projects across a portfolio of £50m. GDI Hub has reached 21 million people since its launch
in 2016 by developing bold approaches, building innovative partnerships, and creating ecosystems to accelerate change. GDI Hub delivers the MSc Disability, Design & Innovation.

GDI Hub leads the cutting-edge assistive technology programme, AT2030, funded by UK Aid, which will test ‘what works’ to get assistive technology to disabled people around the world.

www.disabilityinnovation.org | www.at2030.org | Follow @gdihub @AssistiveTech2030 on Twitter | Check in with our Instagram and Tiktok pages | Watch our YouTube channel and see our Facebook Page | Listen to GDI Hub’s Innovation Action podcasts | Catch up on GDI Hub LIVE Webinar series | See photos from GDI Hub in action on Flickr | #DisabilityInnovation

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