Housing and Disabled People: Scotland's hidden crisis

In 2016 the Equalities and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) began their formal inquiry into housing for disabled people. They looked at whether the availability of accessible and adaptable housing, and the support services around it, is fulfilling disabled people's rights to live independently.

One of 3 inquiry reports, this one spotlight on the state of the housing for people with a disability in Scotland highlighting the impact of unsuitable housing on disabled people. In particular, the EHRC found 4 major challenges that have informed their recommendations:

disabled people are too often demoralised and frustrated by the housing system;
there is a significant shortage of accessible homes;
installing home adaptations involves unacceptable bureaucracy and delay; and
disabled people are not getting the support that they need to live independently.

The resultant Scottish report recommends that more adaptable homes are built for disabled people and that local and national governments engage with disabled people at planning stages drawing specific attention to:

Building more accessible and adaptable homes and calling on the Scottish government to enable clear reporting of new-build accessible and wheelchair-acessible housing by size, property and type, ans ensuring a minimum of 10% new homes are built to wheelchair-accessible standards when planning for accessible homes;
Improving the installation of home adaptions, including increasing resources available for adaptations across all tenures to meet demand;
Matching homes to the people that need them, including embedding independent living principles into housing assessments & allocations as well improving knowledge and monitoring accessibility of housing via accessible housing registers; and
Supporting people to live independently, including better integrated funding across housing, health and care and access to disability advice and advocacy services.

Access the British report
Access the Welsh report