ITV Wales

ITV Wales employed Safyan Iqbal at its Head Quarters in Cardiff Bay. Safyan was born with poor hearing which worsened over time until he had surgery aged 11 to fit a cochlear implant which helped him to hear more clearly. He had always wanted to work in TV but was worried that being deaf might be a barrier.

Nia Britton, Operations Manager at ITV Wales says: “Safyan started doing some work experience with us at ITV Wales, which progressed into a month-long paid internship. Safyan was then selected from hundreds of applicants for the full-time apprenticeship role at our Headquarters. He is now a Creative and Digital Media Apprentice with us, where he’s learnt a variety of skills including how to operate cameras, shoot and edit as part of his ambition to become a camera operator or filmmaker.

Safyan is one of four apprentices and he joined us on merit. We loved his personality and his work ethic – he’s one of the most hard-working people I know and has a huge passion for filming and editing. He’s a great person to be around and he teaches us a lot. We make no assumptions about his ability and we’ll help him as much as he needs it.”