Bethany Handley is an award winning writer, poet and disability activist from South Wales.

Bethany campaigns for Disabled people’s rights and for better access to nature for all, especially for Disabled people. She raises awareness of the physical and attitudinal barriers the most marginalised in our society face when accessing the outdoors and asks why we continue to prioritise access for those who can take access for granted. Bethany believes that since we have created many of the barriers that can prevent people from accessing nature, we can also remove them.

Bethany is an Ambassador for Country Living’s Access for All campaign, for Wales Coast Path and National Trails, and for Ramblers Cymru. Bethany was named one of the ten most influential disabled people working in politics, law and media in the UK, and one of the 100 most influential disabled individuals in the UK in the Shaw Trust’s Disability Power 100.

Her work has been featured by Country Living, BBC Radio 1, BBC Radio 4, BBC Radio 5 Live, BBC Radio Wales, BBC Wales, BBC News, Nation.Cymru, WalesOnline, Metro, POETRY, Poetry Wales, The Welsh Agenda, Buzz Magazine, Spelt, Walk magazine (The Ramblers) and on the Poetry Foundation, amongst others. She was worked with organisations including Plantlife, the Ramblers and Forestry England to promote access.

Bethany is one of the writers on Literature Wales’ Representing Wales 2023-24, she’s an occasional guest reviewer of the Sunday papers on BBC Radio Wales and she was one of the Sherman Theatre’s Unheard Voices. Her debut poetry pamphlet Cling Film will be published by Seren in February 2025.

Bethany was a finalist in Nine Arches Press’ Primers 2023 and she was nominated for The Pushcart Prize 2023. She was awarded the Gold Prize for Creative Non-fiction in the Creative Future Writers’ Award 2023 and was shortlisted for the Royal Society of Literature’s Jerwood Poetry Award 2024.

As an advocate for Disabled writers, Bethany ran Write Back, a writing retreat and mentorship scheme for Welsh Deaf and Disabled writers, with author Megan Angharad Hunter, and Megan, Bethany and author Sioned Erin Hughes are currently editing the first bilingual anthology of Welsh Deaf and Disabled writers which will be published January 2025.

Bethany has worked with many media and third sector organisations to promote the social model of disability and to challenge the barriers Disabled people continue to experience. She is available for disability awareness training, as a keynote speaker, a consultant and as a creative workshop facilitator for all ages.