Housing for Older People

Lord Kakkar Excerpts

Tuesday 15th March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

The noble Lord is absolutely right. There are a number of barriers to older people wanting to sell their current home. The task force will look at ways to incentivise that. That might be through the tax system or through incentivising more suitable housing to be built locally by housebuilders. For example, in New Zealand, I believe that five of the top 10 housebuilders are geared towards providing home villages for the elderly.

[Lord Kakkar (CB)]

My Lords, will the task force be able to consider potentially adopting building standards that would facilitate accommodation for elderly people to ensure that management of their chronic conditions could be most effectively delivered at home rather than requiring admission to hospital?

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

The noble Lord speaks with great authority. That is one of the reasons why the Department of Health and Social Care is also feeding into this task force. There will continue to be certain planning issues, but the planning system has to provide for a wide range of housing needs. However, we have consulted on both options to raise the accessibility of suitable homes for older and, indeed, disabled people, and we will set out the next steps and the government response in due course. We have already published guidance to help councils implement the National Planning Policy Framework. More detail will of course be announced in due course, and I am aware that a planning White Paper is due to come out shortly.