DIsability champion TV Access Project signs project lead

Disability advocate Heloise Beaton has joined campaigning group the TV Access Project (TAP) as its new project lead.

Beaton moves from ThinkBigger!, where she helped to develop disability inclusive practices in collaboration with Bafta and the likes of ScreenSkills.

Taking over from Tanya Motie and Ally Castle, who stepped down last autumn, Glasgow-based Beaton will help to deliver TAP’s ‘Roadmap’ for full inclusion by 2030 and proposed initiatives to monitor progress and develop talent pipelines.

TAP has recently negotiated funding commitments for studios and facilities to appoint an access lead or champion, and is currently looking at industry standards, access to work and talent retention and progression.

Beaton, who was selected as one of the 2023 Edinburgh TV Festival’s ‘Ones to Watch’, started out in TV more than a decade ago on Channel 4's production training scheme, which was run by Think Bigger!. She joined the training company in January last year.

Prior to that, she amassed a string of assistant producer and producer credits on unscripted shows including Mentorn Scotland’s The Big Questions, Firecrest Films’ Supershoppers, Remarkable Television’s Ready Steady Cook and BBC Studios’ Front Row Late.

She will work closely with the TAP Core leadership group: Underlying Health Condition’s Jack Thorne and Genivieve Barr; Cherylee Houston and Laurence Clark of Triple C/DANC; Deaf and Disabled People in TV;s Bryony Arnold and broadcaster representatives Nichola Garde (BBC), Sam Tatlow (ITV), Emma Hardy (Channel 4) and Luke Seraphin (Sky).