Labour must break its silence on accessible housing, say campaigners on 3rd anniversary of broken Tory pledge

Disabled campaigners have demanded that the Labour government finally breaks its silence and takes action to end the accessible housing crisis.

A year ago, Inclusion London – backed by campaign allies – took their demand for the new Labour government to act on accessible housing to the gates of Downing Street.

That protest was timed to coincide with the second anniversary of a pledge by the last Conservative government – which was never fulfilled – to take action to address the critical shortage of accessible homes.

Now Inclusion London – and other campaigning organisations – have used the third anniversary of that Conservative pledge to call again for stricter minimum accessibility standards for new-build homes in England.

They want all new-build homes to meet the M4(2) accessible and adaptable standard, and at least 10 per cent of all new-build homes to meet the M4(3) wheelchair-user standard that would make them suitable for a wheelchair-user to live in.

Laura Vicinanza, senior policy and stakeholder engagement manager at Inclusion London, said this week: “A year has passed but nothing has changed.

“Since Labour took office, they have remained silent.

“Inaccessible homes continue to be built across the country.

“Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of disabled people are stuck waiting, often for decades, for an accessible social rent home, waiting for the safety and stability we need to be able to build a life.”

One in five disabled social housing tenants – and more than 400,000 wheelchair-users – live in unsuitable homes, while only 13 per cent of homes have basic accessibility features, she said.

And she pointed to the government’s commitment to build 1.5 million new homes during the current parliament while continuing to fail to make a “vital guarantee” on accessibility.

Vicinanza (pictured, second from left, with blue placard) said: “Continued delays to raising standards only mean that more and more people will be forced to live in unsuitable conditions, unable to meet the basic needs we all have for a good life.

“Our fight ends when our basic housing rights and needs are met. Until then, we are not going away.”

Three years ago, Conservative ministers pledged to introduce rules that would force all new homes in England to be built to the M4(2) standard of accessibility, except for cases where this was “impractical and unachievable”.

This would have meant that all new homes would need step-free access to all entrance-level rooms, as well as facilities and other features that would make the homes more easily adaptable over time.

But the government opted not to introduce rules that would ensure a minimum proportion of new homes were built to the fully wheelchair-accessible M4(3) standard, with the decision on what proportion of new homes must be wheelchair-accessible to be left instead to local authorities in their local plans.

But the M4(2) rules were delayed as the Conservative government said it needed to consult on the detail of the regulatory changes, something which never happened.

Mikey Erhardt, policy lead for Disability Rights UK, said the government was essentially still relying on “the goodwill of developers to create the homes we all know we need”.

He said: “Little progress has been made to improving the realities of the housing crisis for disabled people.

“Just nine per cent of homes have the most basic levels of accessibility.

“The consultation on improving accessibility to new build homes closed in December 2020, with an announcement to improve standards in July 2022.

“Yet because of the appalling inaction of the previous and current governments, the crisis of inaccessible homes has been allowed to worsen.

“The Labour government must break its silence on this critical issue and commit now to 100 per cent of new build homes being built to improved accessibility standards and at least 10 per cent to wheelchair-user standards.

“These are small commitments in the grand scheme of things but would go a long way to rebuilding trust that the government is listening to us.”

Meanwhile, new polling for the Centre for Ageing Better shows two in three people (66 per cent) believe they would have problems moving around their home and carrying out everyday tasks without major adaptations to their property if they developed a health issue or serious injury.

More than three-quarters of those surveyed (77 per cent) said all new homes should be built to a standard that allows people to live independently if they become disabled or as they age.

A Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government spokesperson said: “Everyone should be able to live in a home that meets their needs.

“That’s why we are determined to provide more accessible housing, as part of our ambition to deliver 1.5 million new homes through our Plan for Change.

“We will set out our policies on accessible new build housing shortly.”

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