HLINks - This week’s essential news, views, resources and upcoming events from the Housing LIN
Welcome to #Jeremytalks and my weekly piece to audio to coincide with our must-read weekly bulletin, HLINks, week-ending Friday, 15 January. Is it me or does everyone feel like there has been a year’s worth of news in the first two weeks of 2021 already?!
In the light of this, we don’t want to overwhelm you so we produce HLINks so that you can dip in and out of the key issues that may be of specific interest to you.
This week, we published a guest blog on how Silva Homes’ has worked to support their older residents during the first two lockdowns. And, if you work in retirement villages or extra care housing, St Monica Trust have extended the deadline of the national RE-COV survey. We are keen to hear how your organisation has managed during the pandemic.
And further to last week’s #HousingMatters on Later Life Audio and Radio Cooperative, this week they released Morya Riseborough’s interview with the Housing LIN SW Leadership Set member, Louise Drew of Shakespeare Martineau, on her take on the retirement living market.
In this week’s HLINks, you can also take tour of 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 the new Housing Forum report out today entitled ‘Older and Wiser’.
In other news, this week we kicked off the TAPPI (Technology for an Ageing Population: Panel for Innovation) Inquiry. Funded by Dunhill Medical Trust, over the next few months, we will bringing together a panel of industry experts and witnesses to explore the scope for a cross-cutting framework that ensures that technology supports an integrated approach to meeting the needs and aspirations of an ageing population.
Check these out 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 in this week’s issue, 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 #Jeremytalks… here
Thanks for listening, stay connected and, above all, be safe during the new lockdown.
Jeremy
New Housing LIN resources
Independent Living during the pandemic – a silver lining
This new Housing LIN guest blog by Dasos Christou, executive director (customer relations) at Silva Homes, a Bracknell based housing association, explores how the organisation has supported their customers in independent living to remain independent during the first two lockdowns.
In particular, it highlights the ways in which they help address overcome rising loneliness and isolation and the impact on residents’ wellbeing to alleviate pressure on local health and social care services. For example, celebrating resident Winnie’s 100th birthday.
Technology for an Ageing Population: Panel for Innovation inquiry kicks off
We are pleased to report that the first TAPPI Inquiry session took place this week. Funded by the Dunhill Medical Trust and chaired by Professor Roy Sandbach (former director at the Institute for Ageing and Innovation), the new Inquiry brings together a panel of industry experts and witnesses who will give evidence and review the scope for a cross-cutting framework that ensures that technology supports an integrated approach to meeting the needs and aspirations of an ageing population.
The TAPPI Inquiry will be holding four virtual evidence gathering sessions over the coming months and also a number of regional sector showcases to capture what good looks like. The Panel's finding will be published in a report this summer. In the meantime, keep informed of progress on this exciting project on the new Housing LIN webpages on the new Housing LIN TeCH platform. Here you can also access the Going Digital and Housing and Telecare resources all under one roof.
Coronavirus Update
With new stronger localised tiered arrangements and national lockdown in place nationally, 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:
COVID-19 Testing – named contact for authorising Extra Care and Supported Living Settings
People in extra care and supported living settings should now be able to access COVID-19 testing through a self-service portal – a key commitment of the Winter Plan. Registration on the portal needs be approved by the local authority. DHSC therefore needs all local authorities to provide a named contact for this simple process. The portal went live before Christmas, but not all local authorities have yet provided a contact, and in some cases the contact has become unresponsive. To read the guidance, register, to check your registration or to raise any questions about the process, please visit the website or contact: Leanne.tyler@dhsc.gov.uk
Coronavirus: National survey launched to learn from pandemic’s impact on retirement housing sector
As reported last month ahead of the new lockdown announcement, we have partnered St Monica Trust in this extensive piece of research funded by the Dunhill Medical Trust. The deadline for completing the RE-COV survey has now been extended to at least Wednesday, 20 January 2021
If you manage retirement villages or extra care housing and would like to take part, email us at: research@housinglin.org.uk
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 or information about how you are engaging with residents remotely?
Housing, Community, Disability, and Ageing
#HousingMatters: In conversation on the airwaves
In their latest instalment of #HousingMatters following the Housing LIN's Summit 2020, Moyra Riseborough of the Later Life Audio and Radio Cooperative talks with Louise Drew, Partner at Shakespeare Martineau solicitors, about her session at the conference and generally with the Housing LIN to rethink older people's needs and aspirations for later living. Louise talks about the challenges and also the myriad of opportunities open to providers, as well as taking us through some of the policies she has helped inform.
Older and Wiser - a practical guide to commissioning, developing and operating age friendly homes
Launched today, this new guide by The Housing Forum looks to address society’s failure to provide suitable homes for the ageing population by setting out a range of practical suggestions with 16 case studies demonstrating diverse solutions and inspired thinking.
With contributions from the Housing LIN, the guide shows how housing associations, local councils and private developers who may be looking to develop specialist housing for the first time, can deliver greater numbers and a wider range of accommodation to meet the needs of older people. Providing better and more suitable housing provision will enable people to live more independently for longer.
In other news
- Foundations tool: Should I Stay? Decision-making tool
- UK Parliament: Concerted Government effort could improve health in old age, finds Lords Committee
Opinion pieces and blogs:
- Care Talk Business article: ARCO responds to leasehold reforms and ground rent ban
- MHCLG rough sleeper announcement: Extra covid protections for rough sleepers and renters
Design, Construction and Technology
Housing Design Awards 2021
We are proud to sponsor these awards organised by Design for Homes and, in particular, draw attention to designing a range of HAPPI-inspired, beautifully designed housing that meets the needs and aspirations of an ageing population. To take inspiration from HAPPI and past winners, view our dedicated design hub webpage.
Inside Housing Development Awards 2021 – Housing for Older People category
Ocean Media have opened entries to celebrate the very best residential developments across the UK from the past two years, including housing developments for older people. The deadline for entries is 18 February 2021.
Mental Health, Learning Disability, Health and Social Care
Supporting adults with learning disabilities to have better lives
While not housing specific, this outcomes and improvement framework, commissioned by the LGA and the ADASS, aims to help directors of adult social services work with their colleagues and partners to identify how they can improve how they support adults with learning disabilities and autism.
Call for papers for Special Issue on Intermediate Care
The Journal of Integrated Care is preparing a Special Issue on Intermediate Care. Their call for papers is now open with submission deadline by 30th April 2021. For details on submitting a research paper, case study or review on your experience of designing, commissioning, delivering, enabling or evaluating transitional and intermediate care services, click on the link below.
Dementia
Housing and Dementia
And the final session of the APPG on Housing and Care for Older People’s Inquiry into the housing experiences of people living with dementia tool place last month week. We are now pulling together the evidence presented and submissions received to produce an Inquiry report for the APPG launch next month.
Wales and Scotland
Wales
Just before Christmas, the Welsh Government published its ‘Strategy for an ageing society: age friendly Wales’. The consultation looks at 4 key aspects relating to: enhancing well-being; improving local services and environments; building and retaining people’s own capability; and tackling age-related poverty.
The document refers to the 2017 Expert Group on Housing and Ageing and, following work by the Housing LIN a year ago on future demand of specialist housing in Wales, recommends growth of new housing models that support people to age well, including contemporary sheltered housing and extra care housing. The deadline for response is 15 March 2021.
It has also launched a consultation on ‘Improving social care arrangements and partnership working’. There is reference to housing and older people’s issues separately in the paper. With a deadline for submissions is 6 April 2021 Housing LIN Cymru will be compiling a response.
- For Welsh government guidance on COVID-19, visit: https://gov.wales/coronavirus
Scotland
Scottish government guidance on COVID-19 can be found at https://www.gov.scot/collections/coronavirus-covid-19-guidance/
Events
Preparing our Spring HAPPI Hour series
We are now working on a new HAPPI Hour programme and look forward to sharing our full Spring schedule of webinars in the coming weeks!
However, you can already sign up to our first HAPPI Hour of the year. Taking place on Thursday, 28 January 2021, and in association with Winckworth Sherwood, we will be joined by the authors of last week’s Housing LIN blog and recent RICS report along with sector leaders from the Almshouse Association, leading architects’ practices and a community land trust to consider the future of Almshouses and explore community-shaped housing for older adults.
Supporting people with learning disabilities at the edges of social care in social housing and the private rented sector
The University of Bristol and the University of York are conducting a research to understand the ways that people with learning disabilities who are on the edges of social care can be better supported to access and enjoy living in their own tenancies in the community, when this is their choice.
To provide evidence and to share understanding about the housing circumstances of people with learning disabilities, research partners, the Housing LIN and Learning Disability England, are organising a series of regional virtual roundtable events during January and February 2021.
Mental Health Foundation is recruiting
Project Manager, 'Picture This' Project
The Mental Health Foundation is recruiting for a Project Manager to oversee their new project ‘Picture This’ building social connections virtually in Later Life Housing Schemes. The post is fixed term for 12 months, full time at 35 hours per week.
In next week’s HLINks
And in next week's news, we look forward to publishing a new Housing LIN viewpoint by a team led by the University of Bristol on their work on what collaborative housing offers in a pandemic.
Lastly, the Housing LIN would like to thank Willmott Dixon for their support in producing this newsletter.