Read HLINks to unlock our weekly round-up of our latest sector news, views, resources and events

#Jeremytalks

Welcome to #Jeremytalks and my weekly piece to audio to coincide with the Housing LIN's weekly bulletin, HLINks, week ending Friday, 27 November 2020.
It has been another bumper week of news and we are pleased to feature stories that we consider most relevant.

This week saw the government publish its Spending Review for the coming year. With much of the emphasis on post-Covid measures that will support the economy and stimulate growth, we are pleased to see some recognition of specialist housing and the allocation of £71m next year, via the Department of Health and Social Care, for the Care and Support Specialised Housing Fund. Furthermore, the Disabled Facilities Grants allocation for councils will rise to £573million in 2020/21, up from £505million this year. We now await further details on other possible capital allocations. However, the Review was disappointing for the social care sector with only an additional £300 million set aside for adult and children services nationally. 

In other news, with new Tier arrangements coming into force from next week in the lead up to Christmas, the government has updated its Covid-19 and supported living guidance and also released its Covid Winter Plan which includes specific reference to the test and trace arrangements for staff and residents in extra care housing from December. Also see details of the accompanying series of webinars explaining how this will work.

In this week’s HLINks, you can also read our curated round-up of other news and events on later life living with regard to homes and communities, health and social care, design and technology, planning matters and more, including reference to a new Action Deafness report on the benefits of designing and developing inclusively extra care housing for deaf people and those who hard of hearing.
  
And with 2 weeks to go, don’t forget to register for next month’s #HLINSummit2020. There are 10  #HAPPIhour sessions spread over 5 days week commencing Monday, 7 December. There is something for everyone! So, if you are interested in intergenerational living or want to find out more about designing accessible homes, want to understand what the digital future of the retirement market is or how can we embed greater leadership qualities to transform the housing and care offer for an ageing population, register now to attend our FREE virtual Summit.

Check this out on our website and register here to keep in touch with all our news alerts and other notifications of your choice, sent direct to your inbox. And remember you can also follow us via our Twitter feeds: @HousingLIN, @HousingLINews and @HLINConsult

Lastly, if you would like to talk to us about any matters highlighted, share learning about your work and/or discuss how our consultancy services can assist you, email ‘Jeremy talks’ at: info@housinglin.org.uk.

You can also listen to Jeremy talks… here

Thanks for listening, stay connected and, above all, be safe,

Jeremy

Spending Review

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This week’s Budget Statement on 2021-22 expenditure included some government allocations that meet the housing needs of older adults and people with long term conditions or a disability. 

It made specific reference to a further £71 million capital allocation for the Care and Support Specialised Housing Fund from the Department of Health and Social Care and a £68 million increase to £573 million towards local delivery of Disabled Facilities Grants to support more older and disabled people to live independently at home for longer. These amounts are dwarfed by the allocation of £1.1 billion under the Green industrial revolution to make homes and buildings net zero-ready and £3 billion additional funding to support the NHS recovery from the impacts of Covid-19, including around £1 billion to begin tackling the elective backlog.

However, as ADASS have highlighted, the Review was disappointing for the social care sector with only an additional £300 million set aside for adult and children services nationally

Coronavirus Update

With a national lockdown and new restrictions in place in England until next week and them new stronger localised tiered arrangements thereafter, check out our Coronavirus Info Hub for the latest government guidance, a range of Housing LIN practice briefings for the sector and links to other useful information and websites.

Useful guidance information

Lastly, do post or reply to questions on our discussion forum. It allows you to share information, raise issues and ask questions to solve a tricky issue. For example, can you share your organisation’s COVID-19 risk plan under the 2nd lockdown or information about how you are engaging with residents remotely?

Housing, Community, Disability, and Ageing

A safe deaf place

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This report by Action Deafness looks to determine a way forward with regard to the design and commissioning of housing and care services that are inclusive of the needs of older deaf people.

Design, Construction and Technology

Final week to have your say on accessible design

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As featured in The Times’ letters page last Saturday, the Housing LIN is proud to be a founding member of the Housing Made for Everyone (HoME) coalition.

It is calling for urgent action to tackle the UK’s accessible housing crisis by raising the mandatory building standards. The government is currently consulting now on options to make new homes in England more accessible for older and disabled people. Deadline is 1 December. Support HoME Coalition and have you say using the resource pack and template provided.

Care Technology Diagnostic and Planning Resource

LGA

The LGA in partnership with Rethink Partners has launched a new tool to help councils reflect on their own care technology offers and support local action planning. It is designed for anyone in a council who has leadership responsibility for care technology.

In other News

Opinion pieces and blogs

Mental Health, Learning Disability, Health and Care

Opinion pieces and blogs

Dementia

Housing and Dementia

APPG Housing and Care for Older People

The final session of the APPG on Housing and Care for Older People’s Inquiry into the housing experiences of people living with dementia will take place next month before digesting the evidence presented to produce its report for a February 2021 launch.

While the APPG’s current call for evidence is formally closed, do email us any examples of innovative practice for the Panel’s consideration at: dementia@housinglin.org.uk

Planning tracker

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Older People’s Care Development – Local Development Plan Monitoring

In association with Tetlow King Planning, this document monitors current local authority planning consultations that may be of interest for those seeking to develop housing for older people. The tracker is updated fortnightly.

Wales

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Welsh government guidance on COVID-19 can be found at: https://gov.wales/coronavirus

Scotland

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Scottish government guidance on COVID-19 can be found at https://www.gov.scot/collections/coronavirus-covid-19-guidance/

Events

Housing LIN Summit 2020

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Our annual conference is back on and, with two weeks to go, we are approaching 700 participants! Do let your colleagues know as we are not restricted by numbers!

Spread across the week of 7-11 December, there are ten free HAPPI Hour sessions with two must-join topical sessions each day to choose from celebrating outstanding innovation, latest research findings, leading practice developments and sector thought-leadership, including a look at the sector transformation that has taken place over the last 9 months as a result of Covid-19. You can now choose as many of the sessions as you want to go to.

Browse Housing LIN Summit 2020 programme and select your choices below:

HAPPI Awareness Week

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And to coincide with Summit 2020 next month, we are also designating the week as the first ever #HAPPIweek. We want to further raise awareness over the 5 days about the virtues of designing ‘care ready’ accommodation and age-friendly housing services.

Join us for HAPPI Hour

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We are now working on a Spring #HAPPIHour programme and look forward to sharing details of our exciting programme of bi-weekly webinars early in the New Year.

And if you missed any of the autumn HAPPI Hour sessions, scroll through and watch/listen again and/or download the slides on the archived events' section of our website below:

Other events

We are pleased to be involved/support the following virtual events:

What’s in next week’s HLINks

And in next week's news, in the lead up to the #HLINSummit2020 and HAPPI Awareness Week, we hope to publish a guest blog by Lord Best giving his insights into how, over a decade on, the HAPPI principles have transformed the dialogue about designing age-friendly homes for an increasingly ageing population. And next Friday, we will also be joining Housing Minister, Christopher Pincher MP, on the Homes UK conference platform where he will be announcing the winners of the Home of 2030 competition.

Lastly, the Housing LIN would like to thank Willmott Dixon for their support in producing this newsletter.

Stay connected, stay well and, above all, be safe!