I've spent the last few days going through documents photographed in better days @UkNatArchives, revealing a treasury of info on the working lives of disabled people. Fascinating to learn that so many men with intellectual disabilities worked delivering coal, or at pit top jobs

Even more worked in agriculture - and there was a widely recognised rate of pay termed 'the handicapped rate', approved by the Agricultural Executive Committees. Even with this rate, for those living in longstay hospitals, half their wage was taken to pay for living costs.

Some 'mental deficiency' hospitals had their own work units. Women folding cardboard boxes for up to 7 hours a day at Whittington Hall Hospital near Chesterfield were given an extra sixpence a week as payment, in the mid 1955s. About 60p in today's money.

Here's a sample personal labour history, of an 18 year old with intellectual disabilities in 1950s Berkshire. But other disabled workers stayed in jobs for decades, particularly women in cleaning jobs (hospitals, hotels, private homes)