North Swindon MP Praises Phoenix Enterprises During Visit

North Swindon MP Justin Tomlinson was delighted to visit Phoenix Enterprises at the charity’s centre on the Groundwell Industrial Estate to meet with Chair Emma Rees and trustees John Stooke and Mike Bowden.

Phoenix provide vulnerable and disadvantaged people with a way back into main stream society and the workplace – assisting with benefits, health and other issues as well as providing a caring supportive environment in which self-confidence can be restored. 

During his 14 months as the Minister for Disabled People, Justin focused on efforts to halve the disability employment gap. Thanks to campaigns such as Disability Confident and increased support for disabled people through the Access to Work scheme, 365,000 more disabled people have found employment in the last two years.

Justin met service users, the staff and was shown the range of work undertaken under full commercial contracts by Phoenix for a range of local, regional and national organisations including Agralan, Darcourts Ltd, British Red Cross, and Macmillan.

Justin Tomlinson MP said: “It was great to visit Phoenix and see the wonderful work that they are doing. During my time as the Minister for Disabled People, I saw how important employment opportunities like this are, and I am pleased that Government is committed to halving the disability employment gap. It is vital that we do even more to help get disabled people into work. Thanks to organisations such as this as well as the Disability Confident campaign, we have seen 365,000 more disabled people find employment and the security that brings".

Emma Rees said: “We have made no secret of the fact that we could provide help and support to many more disadvantaged local people if we were able to secure additional contracts for our services. Our first priority is to support our service users and in doing so we have an excellent record of nurturing people back into the commercial workplace and reducing their reliance on benefits such as Jobseekers Allowance. Any business that has mailing, printing or assembly work that they would like us to tender for is very welcome to contact me on – emma@phoenixenterprises.co.uk Our meeting with Justin covered a wide range of issues and I am optimistic that new and additional contracts will be forthcoming and that Phoenix can play an important, increased role in supported work placements in Swindon.”