Elliott is a Vice Chancellor's Fellow in Public Policy at Northumbria University, Public Affairs Lead for the Common Sense Policy Group and Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. He is founding lead of Northumbria’s Disability and Lived Experience Expert Group, a founding member of the university’s Disability Equality Forum, a member of the university’s Ethics Review College and a member of ESRC’s Peer Review College. 

Elliott is an internationally recognised leader in disability and social security research, with his work focusing on inequalities and social determinants of health, particularly the impact of work and welfare and especially in relation to disabled and underrepresented people. His specific innovations include integration of evidence from existing datasets and primary survey-based research to support modelling, development of adversarial co-production of narratives to persuade opponents of evidence-based policy, and creation of the first generic, adaptive protocol for the evaluation of cash transfer trials within the public health case for Basic Income. He has secured more than £2.6M in funding to support this work.

His work on social security has led to his being invited to provide expert advice to the Government and to the London Assembly’s review of Basic Income. His impact work builds on a background in the third sector, in which he contributed to sector-wide standards, organisational approaches and national policy in four sectors: disability, sport, education and engineering. 

His research, teaching and practice emphasise values and behaviours of collaboration and inclusivity, in particular, seeking to empower colleagues, participants and stakeholders and deliver more equitable outcomes. He co-ordinated the School of Communities and Education’s contributions to the Common Sense Policy Group’s Beveridge-style policy platform, Act Now and leads the school's PhD by Published Work Staff Programme.

He regularly appears as an expert contributor on outlets such as Times Radio and LBC, and served as 2024 UK General Election analysis for BBC Radio. His work has been covered by, among others, the Guardian, Independent, Times, Telegraph, Spectator, FT, BBC, Sky News, Channel 4 News, ITV News, Channel 5 News, CNBC and TIME.

Elliott's primary research interest is the social determinants of health, and the public policy means of addressing them. Much of his work has focused on work and welfare, particularly Basic Income, and especially in relation to disabled people. Specifically, his work examines the following areas:

• Health impact
• Economic feasibility
• Public acceptability
• Narratives to ‘sell’ the policy
• Additional needs, including those of disabled people

He also has broader expertise on inclusion, disability and inclusive physical activity.