House of Commons - Communities and Local Government Committee

Regeneration - Communities and Local Government Committee Contents

Written evidence submitted by HACT Fit for Living Network

SUMMARY

— Regeneration programmes need to encompass mechanisms/approaches that will effectively include low income older home-owners.

— There is no national policy framework which addresses the new social phenomenon of high levels of low income home-ownership combined with increased longevity. This is needed to ensure the necessary co-ordination between a wide range of policy areas including housing, health, public health, social care, information and advice, financial services and tackling fuel poverty/the Green Deal.

— If regeneration programmes do not encompass mechanisms/approaches that will effectively include low income older home-owners, significant additional costs will fall on services, most particularly health and social care.

— The loss of private sector housing funding from 2011-12[57] means that innovation and creativity will be needed to meet the needs of low income older home-owners living in poor and unsuitable housing

— The approach set out in the paper Regeneration to enable growth: What Government is doing in support of community-led regeneration will not address the needs of low income older home-owners living in poor and unsuitable housing which should be an integral component of regeneration

BACKGROUND

HACT, (the Housing Action Charity), works with housing providers to improve the well-being and living conditions of poor and marginalised people.[58] HACT has a long track record of working on older people's and private sector housing issues, right back to when the organisation was first established in the 1960s. This includes its role in supporting Care & Repair services as an innovative way of addressing poor private sector housing conditions.

HACT's Fit for Living Network[59] is looking at new ways of improving the housing conditions and well-being of the most vulnerable and marginalised older home-owners who are living on low incomes in the poorest quality and most unsuitable housing conditions.

The Network brings together around 15 well-connected policy makers, practitioners and older activists engaged in housing, finance, care and support and home improvements for older people from across the public, private and voluntary and community sectors. A list of Network members is provided at Appendix 1.

The Network is focusing on identifying solutions that:

— are person-centred;

— enable people to do things for themselves, ie a supportive self-help approach;

— are evidence-based;

— involve effective collaboration and partnership working;

— can demonstrate impact;

— provide value for money; and

— reflect the diversity of places in which older home-owners live.

Why is there a need to focus on older home-owners living on low incomes and in poor/ unsuitable housing as part of regeneration programmes and approaches?

A growing number of older home-owners living on low incomes also live in poor and unsuitable housing. The preferred tenure of owner occupation in the UK today is working its way through the age groups, creating a situation which is new in both scope and scale.

How this group understands the options for meeting the cost of, and managing, home repairs, maintenance and adaptations is a growing social issue with significant social ramifications, particularly for health, social care and the well-being of the older people themselves, if it is not addressed. This is a group who, predominantly throughout their lives, have taken responsibility for themselves and their housing, but now find themselves unable to continue to do so without financial and practical assistance.

The following facts are particularly pertinent:

— Owner-occupation amongst lower income households has been encouraged for more than three decades. The shift from social renting to owner-occupation has resulted in low income home-owners outnumbering low income households who rent their homes. However, there is poor awareness about the lifetime costs and responsibilities of owning a home and there have been few changes in financial support in recognition of the shift towards more widespread home ownership.

— Two-thirds of low income older households are home-owners.[60]

— One in six low income home-owners lives in a home which is considered "non-decent" and one in three live in homes that do not meet their needs in terms of accessibility or adaptations.[61]

— A significant proportion of low income home-owners do not have significant equity in their homes to enable repairs, improvements or adaptations to be carried out.

— Many older home-owners face significant problems when trying to maintain, repair and improve their homes and older home-owners with sensory impairment, dementia or other age-related conditions face particular challenges.

— If the number of low income older home-owners living in poor and unsuitable homes is not to increase, with associated impacts on services such as social care and health, new, innovative financial models, policy frameworks and practice are needed. Impacts on social care and health include increased admissions to hospital, delayed discharge from hospital and increased demand on social care services including residential care.

— Enabling vulnerable older home-owners to maintain and adapt their homes so that they can continue to live independently will generate significant savings in health and social care budgets, eg:

— a fall at home that leads to a hip fracture costs the state £28,665 on average—over 100 times the cost of installing hand and grab rails;[62]

— where it is appropriate, postponing entry into residential care for one year saves an average of £28,080 per person;[63]

— a hospital discharge service that enables older people to return to a safe and suitable home environment saves over £100 per day—the amount charged to local authorities when patients "block beds"; and[64]

— just one year's delay in providing an adaptation to an older person costs up to £4,000 in extra home care hours.[65]

Developments in a number of policy areas including energy efficiency/tackling fuel poverty, public health, health and social care provide an opportunity to establish a focus on older low income home-owners and how they can be supported to remain safely and independently in their own homes for as long as they chose to do so. Specific examples worthy of note are:

— the Green Deal. Along with low-income private sector tenants, low-income homeowners are most at risk of experiencing fuel poverty. Exciting initiatives are already being developed that incorporate microgeneration and energy management, eg the London Rebuilding Society, Energy Saving Trust and Easy Town Shimmer scheme.[66] The Green Deal will provide an opportunity to scale up such initiatives; and

— the new arrangements for GP commissioning provide a significant opportunity to link health and housing in very practical ways to benefit older low income home-owners, through mechanisms such as repairs and adaptations on prescription and commissioning of minor repairs and improvements by GP consortia.

How effective is the Government's approach to regeneration likely to be? What benefits is the new approach likely to bring?

Regeneration programmes need to encompass mechanisms/approaches that will effectively include low income older home-owners, a growing number of whom live in poor and unsuitable housing and struggle to meet the cost of repairing and adapting their home so that they can stay living there for as long as they chose to do so.

If regeneration programmes fail to do this, the growth in the number of older home-owners living on low incomes and in poor housing will result in additional costs to services, most particularly health and social care, as well as costs to the individuals concerned, their families and the communities within which they live.

The loss of private sector housing funding from 2011-12[67] means that innovation and creativity will be needed to meet the needs of low income older home-owners living in poor and unsuitable housing. This will need to involve new partnerships between private, public and civil society organisations and financial intermediaries.

There is no national policy framework which addresses the new social phenomenon of high levels of low income owner occupation combined with increased longevity. This is needed to ensure the necessary co-ordination between a wide range of policy areas including housing, health, public health, social care, information and advice, financial services and tackling fuel poverty/the Green Deal. A planning framework which sees addressing population ageing as an economic and social priority is needed.

The approach set out in the paper Regeneration to enable growth: What Government is doing in support of community-led regeneration will not address the needs of low income older home-owners living in poor and unsuitable housing which should be an integral component of regeneration. Within the document, the listing of programmes that provide support for vulnerable groups does not include any that focus on older people.

What lessons should be learnt from past and existing regeneration projects to apply to the Government's new approach?

The 2003 report, Now You See Me…Now You Don't,[68] examined how older people were faring in regeneration. The main finding of the report was that there were significant shortcomings in the extent to which older people were being engaged in regeneration of their housing or having their housing needs and aspirations met. These shortcomings must not be repeated in the new approach.

What action should the Government be taking to attract money from (a) public and (b) private sources into regeneration schemes?

Recognise that:

— action is needed at both national and local levels to enable low income older home-owners living in poor quality housing to live independently in their own homes for as long as they chose to do so;

— despite older low income home-owners having a potential asset which can be used to pay for repairs and improvements (their home), many currently have limited, or no, access to conventional sources of finance and credit to fund work to make their homes fit to live in;

— social lending to low income marginalised groups living in lower equity homes is unlikely to be taken up to the extent needed by private institutions;

— the private sector is also likely to have a limited role in relation to directly providing financial products to this group because many older people don't trust the financial products they offer, and because there are a range of other needs that have to be addressed for people to buy into schemes and make use of the money. These include the provision of independent information and advice and practical support to get repair and improvement works carried out;

— the support of trusted intermediaries enabling investment by corporate bodies, banks and wealthy individuals into civil society organisations is needed to unlock the value of homes to make them fit to live in. Such organisations will have a crucial role in raising awareness of appropriate financial products and increasing trust and confidence amongst older low income home-owners in relation to such products. These organisations could include local authorities, housing associations, voluntary sector organisations, Home Improvement Agencies and Community Development Finance Institutions,[69] all of whom have knowledge of, and working links to, local communities; and

— approaches to address the home repair and improvement needs of older low income home-owners can contribute to regeneration through the creation of jobs and training opportunities.

Specifically to attract money to address the home repair and improvement needs of older low income home-owners as an integral part of the approach to regeneration, the following are needed:

— Government promotion of:

— local solutions, encouraging local authorities to take a place-based budgeting approach to the provision of finance for older and vulnerable people; and

— partnerships between local authorities, housing associations, Home Improvement Agencies and Community Development Finance Institutions[70] and other social lenders to ensure appropriate forms of loan finance are available to older low income home-owners.

— Government encouragement:

— for financial innovation in the delivery of home repair and improvement for vulnerable and older low income home-owners, building on existing best practice;

— to the banks to deliver on Corporate Social Responsibility commitments;

— for investment in this area of work from banks, benevolent funds and philanthropists; and

— to Local Economic Partnerships to take a role in ensuring that home improvement loan funds are co-ordinated.[71]

— Government investment in growth of existing social equity release/loan schemes with a track record (such as London Rebuilding Society and Wessex Reinvestment Trust) through application of Big Society funds which would lever in private sector resources. These organisations are currently facing barriers to accessing the necessary capital to expand their work which includes providing various forms of loan products to low income older home-owners.[72]

— Government stimulus of the market for social investment tools, such as social impact bonds, local social investment bonds, and long-term finance using the Big Society Bank.

— Reform of the banking sector to:

— make it more competitive and encourage partnerships to create new financial products and services; and

— encourage new financial intermediaries, competition and greater fairness and inclusivity in financial services (through a UK Community Reinvestment Act).

— Legislative, technical and capacity support from Government and the mainstream lenders to enable charitable grant makers and benevolent funds to deliver housing equity related loans, as an alternative to non-repayable grants, within a compliance and consumer friendly framework.

These actions need to sit within the context of:

— The development of integrated, but locally sourced, information, advice and support services to enable older and vulnerable low income homeowners to make informed choices and access appropriate fair and affordable finance.

— Recognition by housing providers of the role that they can play in meeting the needs of low income older home-owners who live in the communities within which they work. Such roles may include making services and/or home improvement products available to home-owners and working in partnership with Community Development Finance Institutions to enable the provision of appropriate financial products.

— Practical links to the energy efficiency agenda including the Green Deal and Renewable Heat Incentive schemes which are areas of activity that can regenerate and stimulate growth as well as tackle fuel poverty amongst older people, including those home-owners living on a low income.

— National and local promotion of effective local initiatives and services which can be defined as "small input, big impact". These are interventions and initiatives that involve relatively small amounts of resources that can have a significant impact on individuals and their quality of life, eg handypersons schemes, repairs on prescription, hospital discharge schemes etc.[73] Their promotion should include, (where possible), cost benefit analyses, in particular in the context of changes to the ways in which health and social care services are delivered.

March 2011

APPENDIX 1

FIT FOR LIVING NETWORK MEMBERS

Sue Adams, Care & Repair England

Marjory Broughton, South East Regional Forum on Ageing

John Bryson, independent consultant working with Warwick University

Martin Cheeseman, London Borough of Brent

Patrick Conaty, Common Futures

Stewart Fergusson, Orbit Housing Group

Domini Gunn-Peim, Audit Commission

Lindsay Hay, Bristol Care & Repair

Naomi Kingsley, London Rebuilding Society