Disabled Facilities Grants (Review)

Commenting on the English housing survey last week, Habinteg chief executive Sheron Carter said:

“Whilst it’s encouraging to see the proportion of homes with basic accessibility features increasing to 9% from 5% in 2005, it’s clear that the total proportion of homes which are accessible is still woefully inadequate.”

The current situation is simply not good enough. We need an urgent review of the disabled facilities grant in order to make homes truly accessible and to improve people’s quality of life. We also need to build more accessible homes, and to find ways to ensure that that actually happens.

Last week, I met the Minister for Housing, the right hon. Member for Tamworth (Christopher Pincher), together with Kerry Thompson, a Habinteg resident living in an accessible home in Milton Keynes. We discussed the proposed and long-delayed Government consultation on accessible housing and highlighted the lack of accessible housing. I was happy that the Minister agreed to meet us, but it is obvious that much more needs to be done. Kerry, a wheelchair user, spoke only last week of her experience of living in an accessible home:

“Living in an accessible home myself, I know first-hand how vital they are for a disabled person like me. Accessible and adapted homes help alleviate pressures on health and social care services and budgets. They enable greater independence at home and speed up hospital discharges. This is crucial at a time when our NHS and social care provision is already under enormous strain.”

When we are all spending more time at home than ever before, having a home that is fit for purpose is very important. The Department of Health and Social Care recently announced that £505 million will be made available for the disabled facilities grant in 2020-21—the same as the previous year. That is not good enough to meet the challenge of adapting our existing housing stock. With an ageing housing stock, higher numbers of people over 65, an increase in working-age adults with long-term disabilities and more families with disabled children, the need for essential home adaptations continues to rise, and so does the need for funding. It does not have to be this way, and it should not be this way.

What can we do? The Bill calls for a review of how some aspects of the disabled facilities grant operate. In particular, the Government should look at reviewing the disabled facilities grant cap every year, using inflation-based indices to set it accurately and consistently. Furthermore, a disabled facilities grant registry should be created to increase transparency on the number of disabled facilities grant applications and the amounts requested. While the disabled facilities grant cap was last raised in 2008, the cost of adapting homes has gone up, constraining the adaptations that can be made. We must ensure that the grant covers proper, professional building support that will stand the test of time, and we must recognise that we need to develop and fund the best solutions for individuals. On top of that, the Government must review and address the barriers to installing adaptations in the private rented sector. More and more people rent privately, and experience shows that private landlords are often unwilling to allow changes to their properties, even for accessibility purposes.

However, there is another aspect that we need to look at. As smart technology develops and provides real benefits for people with disabilities, we must look at how the disabled facilities grant can be used to take advantage of those developments for housing stock. Smart homes enable older and disabled people to operate things easily around their homes, to stay connected socially and to feel safe and supported—and they enable independence. Recent research shows that cost and poor digital cabling are major barriers to accessing smart home technology, so, where it is assessed as being helpful, the disabled facilities grant should also cover the costs of the installation of cabling and other home modifications to improve digital connectivity.

Of course, we need to move to a position where more of the new homes we build are fully accessible. An insight report by Habinteg last year revealed that just 1% of homes to be built outside London by 2030 are set to be wheelchair accessible. Less than half of all planning authorities have set requirements for new homes to meet the higher accessibility standards.

We cannot continue to kick the can down the road on this issue. That is why we need the consultation on accessible housing that I mentioned. Until we have a real commitment to building that housing, we will continue to rely on the disabled facilities grant to adapt our current inaccessible homes. We need to adapt the scheme and make it better fit the needs of people such as those with muscular dystrophy, who need essential adaptations to make their homes fit their needs and provide the independence that they are entitled to expect.

That Liz Twist, Mary Glindon, Steve McCabe, Andrew Gwynne, Grahame Morris, Yvonne Fovargue, Bambos Charalambous, Jeff Smith, Rosie Duffield, Kate Osborne, Matt Western and Barbara Keeley present the Bill.

Liz Twist accordingly presented the Bill.