Item 2 is an evidence-taking session in our preventative spending inquiry. The theme of the session is housing. I welcome to the committee Yvette Burgess, the director of the housing support enabling unit; David Ogilvie, policy and strategy manager at the Scottish Federation of Housing Associations; and Jim Elder-Woodward, the convener of the independent living in Scotland project.
My interest is in housing support and the support that can help a great deal in terms of tenancy sustainment and ways of moving on from homelessness, as well as longer-term support for groups such as older people in sheltered housing.
I echo those views about the importance of housing support. I should declare an interest, as I am the SFHA representative on the board of the housing support enabling unit.
Our submission focused on independent living, which is a much wider perspective than housing, but includes housing issues. The key message that I would like to get across this afternoon is about the principle of giving choice and control to disabled people. Choice and control are universal—everyone needs more choice and control over their lives. That requires opportunities—you cannot have choice without opportunities—but disabled people have few opportunities to exercise choice in the housing market.
You have brought home to us the benefits of proper action in this matter.
Two different exercises were conducted, and the models that were used in each country differed. If the same model had been used in Scotland, the benefits would have been £907 million as opposed to £441 million. That would have meant a return of 206 per cent as opposed to one of 10 per cent. In England, there were more robust data about the number of older people in very sheltered housing who were using supporting people services. In Scotland, we had a different set of information and we were using a different model.
That is very helpful for our search for accuracy.
We seem to have been talking for a long time about a lack of good information. To take an example concerning housing for people with disabilities, I remember being astounded on one occasion—at least 20 years ago—that there was not a local authority in the country that had a list of people with additional housing requirements. The base of information was very low then. Has it got any better across the various categories of people in housing need?
From a local housing strategy perspective, I am aware of some big issues around identifying the housing and support requirements of people with particular needs. Some years ago, I worked with East Lothian Council on a community care housing needs profiling exercise—one of two such exercises that took place at the start of the local housing strategy round, back in 2003.
I cannot understand why a local authority would not think that there should be a compulsion for it to know the people in its area who have needs of various kinds. I am still stunned to discover that that is not apparent. How can we talk about preventative measures without the baseline information that allows us to work out what they should be—let alone measure the success of any initiatives?
I cannot talk about the global theme, but I can tell you about what is happening in Glasgow. The Glasgow Centre for Inclusive Living is run by disabled people, and I am its chairperson. We have a housing project that is funded by the Scottish Government and the European Union. The housing programme keeps a record of all the adapted housing in Glasgow. It also keeps a record of disabled people who are looking for housing. Our service helps disabled people to identify their needs clearly so that, using our computers, we can match their needs to what is available.
I think that it was Yvette Burgess who said earlier that, if it was possible to increase spending, this would be an area where you would want to do so. We are now going into a period where overall spending is reducing. Do the three of you have any ideas of areas within the housing sector in which money is being wasted? Are there activities that should be stopped and their funds more usefully diverted into housing support, for instance, so that we could get a much bigger bang for our buck? Although some things might have been nice in the days when we had lots of money, now that funding is tighter perhaps we should just stop doing them.
Who would like to answer that?
Nobody likes that question. Are there areas where we are wasting money? The efficiency drive that is now upon us is something that housing associations and co-operatives have been trying to embed into their culture over recent years, and everyone has been under increasing pressure as a result of changes to the overall structure of the housing association sector. People are starting to merge, form group structures or whatever in order to deliver efficiencies.
I will not be popular, but I think that one of the issues about financial waste is that home care and housing support are two powerful services. You are funding two powerful services. If you want to cut costs, you need to amalgamate them into one service. Having two powerful services is not cost effective. I would advocate moving housing support and social care into one basket.
That brings me to the question that I wanted to ask Mr Ogilvie anyway. When housing associations are planning developments and so on, how much attention is paid to the fact that a certain percentage of the houses should be adaptable for disabled use?
As I understand it, all housing associations are working towards housing for varying needs standards, so in fact—
I am sorry to interrupt you, but the key two words in your response were “working towards”. That indicates that they are not doing it yet.
I am hedging my bets because I do not have the statistics with me—I will look into the statistics and come back to you. I will go all the way then. As I understand it, they are expected to do so. I will check exactly to what level they are doing that. I would expect there to be full compliance with that, but I am mindful of my environment, so I want to double-check my facts.
We are looking at preventative spending, and all the evidence that we have from you is that investing in this type of housing keeps people out of hospital and care homes, so it is obviously a cheaper and more cost-effective option. I would have thought that, if you believe what you say in your evidence, in all the plans a certain percentage of housing stock should be disabled compliant.
I believe that that is the case. It is built into the affordable housing investment programme that each local authority will identify how much affordable, accessible housing they need and that percentage is brought forward under the affordable housing policies.
The point is not just about disability, of course—old age brings its own issues. I have helped a number of my constituents to have special adaptations put into their houses, which Mr Elder-Woodward referred to. However, as he pointed out, if they pass away, the equipment is then ripped out of the house and it is returned to its previous state. He said that his organisation keeps a list of houses to which adaptations have been made and then, if one becomes vacant, the organisation tries to match somebody to that house. That is in Glasgow, I think. Is that how it works?
That is how we tend to work. We have very good co-operation from all housing associations and Glasgow City Council to ensure that the data that we keep are up to date, because the data are only as good as what is put into the computer.
One lady in my constituency moved into a house that was specially adapted for her needs after she had become homeless. Then she moved to another house, which also had to be specially adapted, so there was a double hit on the council for the adaptations with which she had to be provided. However, that was her choice. I do not know but, in some ways, is there a responsibility on a disabled person, once they have had adaptations made, to stay where they are?
My understanding is that people can have only a certain amount of money per year. I do not know the figure, but I have a feeling that it is about £25,000. People can gain access to only that amount. I would not want to deny that lady her freedom of movement, and I hope that you would not want to do that. The fact that she moved into a non-adapted house indicates to me that we need more adapted houses to meet demand.
I also want to ask about the pilots in North Lanarkshire and Ayrshire.
It is North Lanarkshire and Argyll.
Sorry. In those pilots, disabled people are having a big say in what is happening with the housing stock. How is that working?
The work began just last month. I was talking to the researcher only yesterday. The Scottish Government has asked a company called Anna Evans Housing Consultancy to evaluate the projects. We are just beginning and we have to finish before March, because the local authorities have to submit their local housing strategies by March. So it is a very tight timescale. There are problems, which I do not want to go into at the moment, but we are hopeful that the outcome will be much better than the previous local housing strategies. One of the aspects of the research is to do a comparative study with the previous local housing strategy to find out what changes have been made. We are at the beginning.
I have a point for Ms Burgess. I guess that most councils’ adaptation budgets are a bit of a moveable feast. In my area, that seems to be the budget that goes most quickly. However, it follows from the evidence that we have heard about spending more to keep people in their own homes that housing adaptation budgets should rise in comparison with other budget lines in the housing sector.
I am not an expert on housing adaptation budgets, but housing support can be effective in helping people to work out what adaptations might be needed and how they should obtain them.
How much of a crossover exists between home care and health care, to which Mr Elder-Woodward referred? An occupational therapist might have a different view on what a suitable adaptation is from somebody from the council.
In relation to what their budgets should be used for?
Yes.
I can imagine that discussions could take place about that.
Do you see merit in the two services getting together?
If I recall correctly, Mr Elder-Woodward pointed out that care at home and housing support seem to collide and work with the same individuals in some circumstances. When that happens, room exists for rationalising services. Now that the ring fence has been lifted from housing support—the supporting people funding—the criteria for housing support are no longer as rigid as they were. That means that it is perfectly possible to use a single pot of money—the local authority’s budget—to fund a service that incorporates care at home and housing support.
Several local authorities provide sheltered housing or housing that is designed for pensioners. Should such accommodation be taken out of the right to buy?
Yes—absolutely.
That has not been done in my area.
I was very interested in the reference in Yvette Burgess’s submission to the Department of Health’s key questions for decision makers in relation to preventative health measures, which apply in England and Wales. Has the NHS in Scotland or the Scottish Government done equivalent or parallel work to ask similar questions?
I was not aware of such work when I did research for the submission. The document to which I referred was written up fairly recently, so people are focusing on it.
We can consider that in more detail.
I would be reluctant to say “yes” whole-heartedly. We have varying reports from our members nationwide about the degree to which they are engaged successfully in the community planning process, which, as you will be aware, is very much driven by local authorities and their national health service partners. If housing partners are not at the table, they will not be able to deliver the new forms of housing for older people, for example, if they are looking for health funding to make it work. If they are not at the CPP table, that will not take off. We have had anecdotal evidence that that is the case.
When I was elected seven and a half years ago, I had a briefing from the health board on joint futures, which was the big idea of having aligned budgets and moving towards joint budgets. I know of cases in which a council occupational therapist and a health board occupational therapist delivered services at different times to the same household and often to the same constituent but, because of the different budgetary years, could not align their budgets. We still have that situation in effect. We are talking about making a step change in approach towards preventative spend, but we might be here in another few years having the same kind of discussions about the local government agenda, whether or not it has a different relationship with the Government and whether or not there are single outcome agreements or a successor to them.
I think that that is right. In housing support, the cost benefits are often in the use of health care services, particularly emergency beds. In a period when public finances are so stretched, the fear is that local authorities will be forced back to looking after their statutory duties, which might mean that they cannot focus on funding the things that would lead to savings in the health service. For that reason, aligning budgets would make a lot of sense.
The committee has heard interesting evidence from other organisations about different ways of delivering budgets. That might involve direct payments—I do not know whether there is any feedback on how they are going. Rightly or wrongly, the council in my area has been looking at transforming older people’s services. The health board was not part of that decision-making process; it was simply consulted. That emphasises the point that David Ogilvie made. We have looked at areas where funding might be provided direct to individuals, so that they can choose how they purchase or commission services, or to representative bodies, community care forums or other consortia of voluntary bodies. Would that help you in thinking about the future of preventative care, because there would be much more focus on the user? Alternatively—I guess that there is a perverse element—might they just want more and more money? Is anyone considering that?
The personalisation policy that you have been alluding to is taking off more in England than in Scotland. The personalisation policy is that a person has what is called an individual budget, which comprises social care, health care adaptations and independent living fund money all in one pot. It is up to individuals themselves, with advice from the council and others, to decide how to spend that money.
I did. You give the impression that the fact that the process is preventative is almost a positive by-product because it is focused on what the individual needs. People can make the decision that is in their best interest.
People are able to choose items and provisions that are not commonly available. For example, they are able to buy a fan to reduce the heat in the house. Our home care service people would not be able to buy a fan for someone, but they would have to attend to the outcome of the individual’s sweating. Those new ways of meeting needs are more available under a personalised agenda than they are under a ring-fenced-budget approach. I hope that that is clear. I am not very good at explaining the RAS. Actually, nobody knows what it is.
In paragraph 7.7 of your submission, you state:
It was North Lanarkshire.
There are potentially two elements of preventative spending under the subject of housing. The first is to do with infrastructure. It is about the benefit of housing—the house itself—and the ways in which that is preventative, be that in the design of the house, its size, the fact that it is barrier free, or the whole-life approach that we have spoken about. Personally, I believe that good design goes a long way towards increasing wellbeing, so spending on it is therefore preventative spending.
One of the bold targets that the Scottish Government and indeed the Scottish Parliament have set out since 1999 is the 2012 homelessness target. The Parliament can justly be proud of that target. However, in terms of preventative spending, there are grave concerns that, if we make the wrong cuts, we will not meet that target. The SFHA strongly advocates investing in housing and increasing housing supply, not least because it helps to meet housing need across the board, whether it be what we call general housing need or specialist housing need, but also because, in that process, there are opportunities to create jobs.
It is important that a range of housing types is available to people—particularly people who have support needs. Thinking about one of the examples that I have been able to call on, I am greatly indebted to Jane, who allowed us to share her experiences. We know that supported accommodation plays an important part in helping people to move through unsettled periods of their lives. When it comes to housing, it is not just about providing self-contained accommodation; we need to have supported accommodation where there is scope for people to provide support. It is also important that we have smaller units of accommodation to allow individuals to develop the independent living skills that they have not previously had a chance to develop.
I think that it is important that we build for life because that will allow people to move into independence more easily. I am working with Capability Scotland on its efforts to move people out of long-term care back into the community. One of the major problems is finding suitable housing for such people. Fortunately, we have come across a local housing association that might be able to help, but that is after years and years of talking to local authorities that promised to find housing for such people in Renfrew. If there were more such housing, that would allow greater freedom of movement for disabled people and would allow them to remain in the community for much longer than they do nowadays.
I want to come on to the other element of potential preventative spend. If we are saying that, in the longer term, decent housing has knock-on benefits for everyone who has a need for shelter, including educational and health benefits, we need to address the lack of joined-up working, which has come up with other panels that we have spoken to about preventative spend. I think that it was Mr Elder-Woodward who mentioned bureaucracy. We seem to have a bureaucratic system in which everyone is in their own silo and where there is a great reluctance to be innovative in thinking about what is best and how all public funding can be used most cost effectively and most effectively for the wellbeing of the person.
Who would wish to answer that?
Go on, Yvette.
Could I maybe alter the question slightly?
No.
I will go first. I do not think that it is as simple as doing one thing, but I think that we ought to encourage bureaucrats to realise that the money that they manage belongs not to them but to the people. We want them to get the message, “It’s not my budget, it’s the people’s budget.”
That is the kind of response that I was looking for. As Mr Elder-Woodward said, there does not seem to be a recognition that public funding is for the benefit of the public. There is a responsibility on everyone who uses public funds to ensure that they are used to the best advantage of the public, whether collectively or individually.
I was struck by the sheer magnitude of the question—I thought, “Woah!”
I will draw this section of the meeting to a close, as the witnesses have nothing further to add. Thank you very much for your presence and for the evidence that you have given us, which will be extremely helpful to us.