Supported Housing

Baroness Uddin Excerpts

Thursday 30th March 2023 Grand Committee

[Baroness Uddin (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, it is a privilege to follow the noble Earl and I thank my noble friend for her leadership in this debate.

Homelessness is not just about people sleeping rough on the streets. The lack of affordable, quality homes means that families and individuals endure poor-quality, privately managed, often cramped and unsanitary accommodation. For people with physical disabilities, there is often dangerously inadequate and unfit housing which is not sufficiently monitored, causing untold strain on their mental health and physical well-being.

I speak from two perspectives. The first is experience of leadership in a local authority and managing a housing association which provides an excellent quality of accommodation. The other is recently supporting a vulnerable adult on a journey through the maze of supported living.

If the system works well and a person is discharged into good-quality provision, it can be transformative, as noble Lords with far more expertise than I have said, with life-changing outcomes, an impact on individuals’ health and well-being and a reconnection to social interaction in the community—even a transition to independence.

While those are ideals, it is not the experience of many whom I have come across during the past 18 months, whether the supported accommodation is run by an independent residential care home or by a private landlord contracted to a local authority with a portfolio of housing that is often poorly, and sometimes wholly dangerously, adapted and managed. Frankly, I do not know how such accommodation has passed the inspection standards to meet the statutory duty of care.

Many individuals are stuck with desperate needs, with local health and social services simply overwhelmed because of a lack of funding, social workers, occupational therapists and other professionals, without whom many remain unnecessarily in extremely costly residential care homes. For example, lack of co-ordination between services in Medway meant that an individual who had recently had an amputation, and following positive rehabilitation in London, was placed back in Medway in costly yet wholly unfit accommodation where he was not able to properly access the toilet or shower facilities for three months, scraping his hands every time he tried to access his bedroom when leaving his kitchen or toilet.

This young man experienced 17 falls in three months trying to access the toilet over a very unsatisfactory ramp and without the promised level of local authority support, which the local authority was supposed to be paying for. As a result, he ended up in hospital for a further six months. Harrowingly, he then went back to a residential home for another very expensive batch of rehabilitation. It is a vicious circle: a process in which an individual in desperate need is not able to effect or influence change.

Due to a reduction in funding packages for supported housing, many residents are transitioning directly from a residential home or hospital into somewhere not fit for human habitation, let alone for people with complex physical needs, where local authorities are constrained with funds and have to work within the boundaries of the housing benefit cap.

I ask the Minister what consideration has been given to people accessing the good-quality homes that are often lying empty in an area when the same authorities are forced to pay thousands to residential homes and charlatan landlords who profit from their misery. It is not compassion we should talk about today but statutory duty of care and the obligatory standards we would set for ourselves.

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[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

I take that into account; I will look at it and come back to the noble Baroness.

[Baroness Uddin (Non-Afl)]

Also just before the noble Baroness sits down, as a former social worker, I understand the differences very well. The point that I was trying to make—perhaps in a rush—is that there is a transition from residential healthcare via social services. Local authorities have some responsibility for ensuring that people are placed properly.

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

I absolutely agree.