Asked by: Stephen Lloyd (Liberal Democrat - Eastbourne)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of bringing forward legislative proposals to place a statutory duty on care homes to install fire sprinklers.
Answered by Dominic Raab
The Government has commissioned Dame Judith Hackitt to take forward an independent review of the Building Regulations and fire safety system. Any decision on future fire safety requirements will be taken following the completion of that review, which is expected to be published in Spring 2018.
Asked by: Stephen Lloyd (Liberal Democrat - Eastbourne)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, whether his Department has made an assessment of trends in the level of new build homes that can be adapted effectively to reflect the changing (a) mobility and (b) access requirements of older people.
Answered by Alok Sharma - COP26 President (Cabinet Office)
The Department’s English Housing Survey collects information on the accessibility and adaptability of all homes, including new homes. The most recent report can be found at https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/english-housing-survey-2014-to-2015-adaptations-and-accessibility-of-homes-report.
Asked by: Stephen Lloyd (Liberal Democrat - Eastbourne)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, whether his Department plans to meet the target that all new homes should be built to meet the lifetime homes standard by 2030.
Answered by Alok Sharma - COP26 President (Cabinet Office)
In October 2015, the Government introduced new requirements to the Building Regulations allowing local authorities to apply a new minimum standard to new housing developments if they feel this is necessary, justified by need, and does not compromise the viability of the development.
Asked by: Stephen Lloyd (Liberal Democrat - Eastbourne)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what steps his Department is taking to encourage older people with care needs to move to (a) homes and (b) communities with supported living services.
Answered by Marcus Jones - Treasurer of HM Household (Deputy Chief Whip, House of Commons)
This Government is committed to supporting older people to live independently for as long as possible, including through providing them with a better choice of accommodation. We committed to ensuring we bring forward more homes that meet the needs of older people, as set out in the Housing White Paper. We will consider the important role of housing in our upcoming Social Care Green Paper. This is due to be published by summer 2018.
The Disabled Facilities Grant helps older and disabled people to live independently and safely in their own homes through funding adaptations. Government has invested over £1.6 billion into the Grant, providing around 250,000 adaptations by the end of the 2017-18 financial year.
We announced on 31 October that funding for sheltered and extra care housing will remain in the welfare system, with some new but proportionate cost controls. This will enable providers to continue investing to meet the growing demand for this provision from older people. We also support this investment through our Affordable Homes Programme and the Department of Health’s Care and Support Specialised Housing (CASSH) Fund.
Asked by: Stephen Lloyd (Liberal Democrat - Eastbourne)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, how many people presented as homeless in each local authority area in England and Wales in each month from January 2017.
Answered by Marcus Jones - Treasurer of HM Household (Deputy Chief Whip, House of Commons)
The Department for Communities and Local Government publishes regular statistics on rough sleeping, statutory homelessness and homelessness prevention and relief in England. These are published at a local authority level.
The latest statistics can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/homelessness-statistics.
The Government remains committed to reducing homelessness and rough sleeping. No one should ever have to sleep rough. That is why we are aiming to halve rough sleeping by 2022 and eliminate it altogether by 2027. To achieve this, we will set up a new homelessness reduction taskforce that will focus on prevention and affordable housing, and we will pilot a Housing First approach to tackle entrenched rough sleeping.
We are also implementing the most ambitious legislative reform in decades, the Homelessness Reduction Act, which will ensure that more people get the help they need earlier to prevent them from becoming homeless in the first place.