Organisations across the UK can now apply for grant funding to test new ways of helping disabled people and people with long-term health conditions move towards work, enter jobs, remain in them and progress.
The Pathways to Work Innovation Fund has opened its first application round, with applications due by 26 October. It is aimed at public bodies, businesses, voluntary and community organisations, as well as partnerships and consortia. An applicant organisation must be based in the UK.
A £60 million programme, released in stages
The programme is described as an investment of up to £60 million over two years. Up to £10 million is available in the round now open, while a further £50 million is expected to be made available in a second round early in 2027.
That structure matters. The opening does not mean that £60 million has been awarded, or that individual projects have been selected. It begins a competition for proposals. Shortlisted bids will be reviewed by an advisory panel, which will make recommendations on the projects to fund.
The panel includes Baroness Tanni Grey-Thompson alongside technology and innovation specialists, employer representatives and people with experience of disability policy and employment support. Its role is to help shape the fund and review shortlisted applications, rather than to operate services itself.
Testing ideas rather than extending business as usual
The fund is intended to back proposals that are new or significantly different, and that can generate evidence about what works for whom. Possible approaches include a new use of technology; a new service, product or delivery model; a partnership that joins up employment, health and skills support; or measures that help employers support disabled staff and applicants.
An existing intervention may be eligible where it is being used in a substantially different setting, labour market or for a new group. Simply delivering an existing service, expanding support without a meaningful learning opportunity, or making minor changes is not the purpose of the scheme.
Examples raised around the launch include AI-assisted job matching, affordable prosthetics and digital therapeutic support for mental health. They are illustrations of the type of innovation sought, not a list of approved projects or a guarantee that any particular technology will receive public money.
What applicants will need to show
Alongside an application, bidders are expected to provide a delivery-and-milestones plan and a budget showing how requested funding would be used to test, develop, implement or evaluate an idea. The emphasis is on practical proposals that could create learning capable of being adopted, copied or scaled if the evidence supports it.
For organisations that need partners, a partnership directory is due to be published by 5 October. Before an online application portal is introduced in early October, applications can be submitted using the published form by email or post. Those arrangements may be particularly relevant to smaller organisations deciding whether to assemble a consortium before the deadline.
Part of a wider employment-support plan
The fund sits within a wider £3.5 billion plan intended to improve employment support for disabled people and people with health conditions. The innovation programme has two connected objectives: improving routes into, through and beyond work, and building evidence that can inform future support.
The policy case is not that one grant round will close the disability employment gap on its own. It is that carefully tested projects can identify approaches worth taking further, while also involving employers, local partners and people with lived experience. For prospective applicants, the immediate development is more concrete: the first funding round is open, its criteria set a high bar for novelty and learning, and the 26 October closing date is now in place.
