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Housing and Regeneration Bill

moved Amendment No. 116A: 116A: After Clause 317, insert the following new Clause— ““Choice-based disability housing register In section 167 of the Housing Act 1996 (c. 52) (allocation in accordance with allocation scheme), after subsection (2E) insert— ““(2F) Subject to subsection (2), the scheme shall contain provision for the creation of a disability housing register consisting of— (a) a record of existing or planned accessible residential properties in the local authority area, whether purpose-built or adapted, with details of the access features relating to each property and location details and other residential properties which would otherwise meet the particular requirements of disabled persons; (b) a record of disabled persons who require such properties; (c) a service of enabling and supporting disabled persons to bid for properties so recorded; and (d) a mechanism for ensuring such persons are accorded priority status for such properties within the allocations process. (2G) For the purposes of this section— ““accessible residential properties”” means dwellings, flats and houses in multiple occupation in England and Wales which provide a reasonable means of access in and around the property and ease of use for disabled persons or which may easily be adapted to provide such access and ease of use; ““residential properties which would otherwise meet the particular requirements of disabled persons”” means properties which would be suitable, either in terms of their size, particular features or location, for disabled persons who have disability-related requirements other than or in addition to access requirements. (2H) This section is without prejudice to the right of disabled persons to bid for properties other than those mentioned in subsections (2F) and (2G) above. (2I) In performing their duties under this section, each local housing authority shall have regard to any guidance given from time to time by the appropriate authority.”””” The noble Baroness said: I apologise that illness prevented me from speaking to the amendments in my name last week. The Committee no doubt welcomed the chance to speed up proceedings, but the bad news is that I hope to speak to them on Report. The purpose of this amendment is to place a statutory duty on local housing authorities to set up and maintain a choice-based disability housing register. Everything is in favour of the amendment except one thing. It has the virtue of ensuring that disabled people are housed in suitable homes as quickly as possible, thereby saving substantial costs to the health service when people cannot be discharged home. It prevents disabled people from becoming unnecessarily dependent on our overstretched care services. It saves thousands of pounds for local authorities being spent on disabled facilities grants, and makes best use of a scarce and valuable resource. What is more, both the Government and the Opposition support the establishment of disability housing registers. The only thing against the amendment is that it requires local authorities to do something to help disabled people when they might prefer to spend our council tax on other priorities. The Committee will have read the depressing statistics in the briefings from RADAR, Care and Repair and Habinteg. Today, 1.5 million disabled people are in need of accessible accommodation, with 371,000 living in completely unsuitable housing. Approximately half of all disabled children live in unsuitable housing. One-quarter of all households in non-decent homes include someone who is long-term ill or disabled. A survey by the John Grooms charity revealed that 40 per cent of disabled respondents said that their housing made them unnecessarily dependent on other people. That means that among those 1.5 million disabled people are those like James, who was in his late 40s when he had a stroke. He had a wife and two children but he was then in a wheelchair and his family home was not accessible. His local authority was able to offer only residential care as an option, separating him from his family. James is now 50, divorced and unable to move out of the care home and back to work. Had the authority had a disabled housing register to ensure that he was moved quickly to the next available wheelchair-friendly home, it would have saved money—and possibly a marriage and family—as well as enabling James to stay in work. Accessible housing is a scarce resource, yet a recent analysis of lettings in the social housing sector found that, on average, only one in six wheelchair-standard dwellings was let to a household containing a wheelchair user. What an appalling waste; yet there is a solution, and that is the choice-based disability housing register, which provides a mechanism for matching accessible housing stock with the disabled people who desperately need that accommodation. Not only does it mean that the appalling human cost in diminished lives, strained and broken relationships, extra hospital admissions and increasing but unnecessary demand on the social care services will be avoided but that local authorities will save millions of pounds. The example of Cardiff was cited in the Government's recent National Strategy for Housing in an Ageing Society. Within three years of establishing an accessible housing register, successfully rehousing 300 disabled people between 2002 and 2005, the city saved £1 million from the disabled facilities grant. If all local authorities in England had operated a register last year, more than £70 million could have been saved from the health, social care and adaptations budgets. Accessible housing registers have strong cross-party support, and the ageing strategy has said that the Department for Communities and Local Government will encourage the adoption of accessible housing registers. However, that is not enough. Unless local housing authorities are statutorily required to set up choice-based accessible housing registers, they will never get the political priority they require and there will always be some councillor's pet scheme to edge them out of the way. Our homes are the essential foundation—the building block—of independent living. The principles of choice and control form the policy of all the main political parties. However, unless the Government are willing to require that scarce accessible housing stock is matched to the disabled people who need it, there is small hope that any real progress will be made. I beg to move.