"Illness and injury don’t discriminate by level of seniority. Neither should benefits."
- Vanessa Sallows, Group Protection Claims & Governance Director at L&G Retail
Legal & General (L&G) believes that Group Income Protection (GIP) can represent a scalable solution to help employers improve equity, diversity & inclusion (EDI) outcomes. Therefore, it will now provide a framework to help intermediaries discuss this with their clients, in a way that also ensures a focus on organisational culture.
This support will be provided through its ‘Be Well. Get Better. Be Supported’ service, aiming to keep employees happy, healthy, and productive – regardless of existing or new health conditions or disability.
Alongside day-to-day support for employees – and their immediate families – to help prevent short-term absences from becoming long-term, L&G highlighted that GIP provides access to vocational rehabilitation. This considers the needs of the whole person, helping ensure a sustainable return to work when the time comes.
“What could be more equitable and inclusive than providing a benefit that’s designed not to discriminate, one which aims to support employees to stay in good work, whatever their health condition or disability; invisible or not,” explained Vanessa Sallows, Group Protection Claims & Governance Director at L&G Retail.
She said: “Accompanied by added-value benefits that also support the wellbeing of employees’ immediate families, providing access to services such as a virtual GP, physiotherapy, mental health services, and more. However, to fully support EDI goals, GIP needs to be provided to all employees, not just the management team.”
Dr Tarun Gupta, Chief Medical Officer of UK Protection at L&G Retail, added “For the benefits of diversity to be felt by people and organisations, the conditions for equity and inclusion need to be created. GIP has an important role to play in this.”
“As it’s designed with no barriers to access, GIP can not only afford valuable financial peace of mind, but also everyday wellbeing support, and access to a vast range of vocational clinical expertise when sickness or injury strikes,” he concluded.
