Emily Yates

Accessibility consultant, Emily Yates is a travel writer, speaker, and a regular presenter for the BBC. She is a business owner based in Glasgow after dividing her time between the UK and Rio de Janeiro, where she worked with the underground transport system to promote inclusion for the 2016 Olympic and Paralympic Games. This role included agreeing architectural blueprints for existing and future stations, pitching to businesses for sponsorship, negotiating and overseeing the installation of modernised equipment and assessing health and safety risks to travellers with disabilities, the elderly and parents with small children. She also trained members of staff within the metro system on a disability awareness programme, and helped to provide bilingual translations for station signposts. Emily is a wheelchair user herself and welcomes further international positions and challenges.

Emily campaigns for disability rights in the UK and works for a charity called Enhance the UK, where she gives motivational talks and delivers disability awareness training in schools, businesses and other organisations, including The National Gallery, Scope and the BBC to name a few. She has also worked for the United Nations in New York, where she gained knowledge of the historical and cultural foundations and developments of the United Nations and was involved in global meetings with lesser developed countries which reflected on issues such as conflict resolution and electoral campaigns. Emily also worked at the House of Commons for a month, shadowing her local MP and attending talks with the Department for International Development (DfID), several of which focused specifically on access and inclusion.

After volunteering as a Games Maker, and being mentioned by Lord Sebastian Coe at his Closing Ceremony Speech at the London 2012 Paralympic Games, Emily has now written a Lonely Planet accessible travel guide to Rio de Janeiro and the 2016 Olympic and Paralympic Games, aimed at those with a lesser mobility who wish to experience the incredible atmosphere of London 2012 once more, but may need extra support and advice on where to stay, what to eat, and who to travel with. She worked closely with the British Consulate in Rio, and this travel guide is also endorsed by the International Paralympic Committee.

Emily runs her own business, Globe Hopper Guides, creating accessible travel guides and vlogs, as well as providing access consultancy for businesses and organisation all over the UK and abroad. She has given a TED Talk on sexuality and disability, written for The Guardian, The Independent, Telegraph Travel, the BBC and Huffington Post, and has also recently presented two documentaries and narrated a 4 part series for BBC3, all of which can be found on the iPlayer. She was the first wheelchair user to cross the Sinai Desert, and has lived and worked in Australia, China, southern Africa, Bali and Brazil.