Disabled People on the Housing register

The request was partially successful.

Dear Cotswold District Council,

I would like to do a freedom of information on the data held about disabled housing. At present my Occupational therapist is of the understanding that there are no policies that say a percentage of new housing has to be 'disabled standard' properties, is that true? There is a risk that demand is not being met, but to gauge the demand in line with supply we need to know statistics to better understand the situation. In the Cotswold's area I am told there is a lack of disabled properties owned by housing associations and the local authority so it would be important to also include this in my request. In addition my last two questions are very important as Bromford's no-longer allow under-occupancy, however the issue of having a small 2 bedroom property that was initially intended as a 1 bedroom property has caused many issues, partly trying to adapt it as a disabled home as it has already had an extra room squeezed into it but also in the fire regulations which now have to adjust to the room classification being a permanent bedroom. The hope in this questioning will hopefully highlight the scale of the impact reclassification has caused not just financially but also to those on the waiting list. I lay out this request as a number of questions, please note a disabled 'standard' property would be one that allows for a 1.5 m turning circle in each room to allow for an indoor wheelchair user.

1. a) How many properties in the Cotswold district are adapted for disabled use?
b) Of those properties how many are 2 bedrooms?
2. a) How many properties in the Cotswold district were built for disabled use?
b) How many of those are 2 bedrooms?
3. a) How many properties have the Cotswold council planned to build in the next 5 years?
b) How many of those are disabled standard properties?
c) How many are 2 bedroom homes both disabled 'adaptable' and/or built as disabled standard?
4. a) How many Disabled people do you have listed with you as being unsuitably housed due to medical needs?
b) How many of those require a 2 bedroom property?
c) How long have these people been waiting for a property to become available?
5. Has anyone since the bedroom tax been introduced (2004) applied to the council for their second bedroom to be discounted as either, a) too small (under 70 square feet), b)historically used as something other than a bedroom (ie a dining room) , or c) used for an overnight carer?
6. How many people are listed as requiring a 1 bedroom disabled accessible property in the Cotswold area in the last 2 years?

Yours faithfully,

Ginger Stark

FOI, Cotswold District Council

Dear Sir/Madam

Thank you for your enquiry regarding Freedom of Information. Your request has been logged using reference 17396 and passed to the relevant department for response by 30th August 2017.

Kind Regards

Emma North
Customer Services Support Officer
Cotswold District Council
High Street
Moreton in Marsh
Gloucestershire GL56 0AZ
Tel: 01608 650881 (Ext 7024)
Email: [email address]

If you are unhappy with the service you have received in relation to your request and wish to make a complaint you should write to The Monitoring Officer, Cotswold District Council, Trinity Road, Cirencester, Gloucestershire GL7 1PX.

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Lisa Firstbrook,

Good afternoon Ginger Stark,

 

Here is my response:

1. a) How many properties in the Cotswold district are adapted for
disabled use? We do not hold this information as we do not have our own
stock

     b) Of those properties how many are 2 bedrooms? See above

2. a) How many properties in the Cotswold district were built for disabled
use?  As above

     b) How many of those are 2 bedrooms? As above

3. a) How many properties have the Cotswold council planned to build in
the next 5 years? Our current target is a minimum of 150 homes per annum.
This will be reviewed in 2020 in line with the Council's Housing Plan

    b) How many of those are disabled standard properties?  There is no
set target for disabled standard properties

    c) How many are 2 bedroom homes both disabled 'adaptable' and/or built
as disabled standard? See above

4. a) How many Disabled people do you have listed with you as being
unsuitably housed due to medical needs? There are 27 people on our
register who are registered disabled and have banding to recognise they
have medical/welfare needs

     b) How many of those require a 2 bedroom property? 8

     c) How long have these people been waiting for a property to become
available? These applicants have been waiting from 26 months to 1 month

5. Has anyone since the bedroom tax been introduced (2004) applied to the
council for their second bedroom to be discounted as either, a) too small
(under 70 square feet), b)historically used as something other than a
bedroom (ie a dining room) , or c) used for an overnight carer? We don’t
hold this information

6. How many people are listed as requiring a 1 bedroom disabled accessible
property in the Cotswold area in the last 2 years? We do not have these
records as our system is a live system but we currently have 99 people
waiting for housing who are registered disable and have a 1 bedroom need

 

Lisa Firstbrook

Housing Operations Manager

Tel: 01594 812492

[mobile number]

 

Dear Lisa Firstbrook,

Thank you for your response can I ask in relation to the information about bedroom tax, you mentioned you do not have that information, who does?

Yours sincerely,

Ginger Stark

Lisa Firstbrook,

Dear Ginger Stark,
For us this question is hard to answer and I would not be certain who to direct you to. We can look at people who are downsizing but there is no guarantee that the applicant is moving because they are subject to bedroom tax. We don’t own any properties so we wouldn’t know if they had asked for a bedroom to be discounted or if they were using a living space as a bedroom - maybe registered social landlords would have that information. We could tell you if a bedroom is awarded because of a need for a carer to be accommodated but would be able to link this to someone subject to bedroom tax currently.

Apologies for not being of much help in this area but the question requires information from different places and a significant amount of investigating.

Kind regards

Lisa Firstbrook
Housing Operations Manager
Tel: 01594 812492
[mobile number]

Dear Lisa Firstbrook,

I apologise, but I believe the process of applying for a room to be discounted from the bedroom tax requires the occupant to apply for this under the housing act 2004 to the council whom apply the housing benefit reduction, therefore I assume that the housing benefit discounts team would have some statistics on that as the housing association do not issue housing benefit reductions.

Yours sincerely,

Ginger Stark