Can you remember how you saw in the new year? Jim Leftwich has fond memories. ‘My wife and I danced the night away to Showaddywaddy,’ he recalls. ‘How’s that for living?’
Leftwich is a very happy resident of Hughenden Gardens Village, a 260-apartment development by the ExtraCare Charitable Trust in High Wycombe where a tribute act – Showaddywaddy Elite if you want to book them – ushered in 2024 with their covers of the original band’s own covers of rock ‘n’ roll classics like Three Steps to Heaven and Under the Moon of Love. You probably had to be there.
Judging by his enthusiasm for life at Hughenden Gardens, Leftwich seems to think he has arrived if not at heaven itself, then at something very close to it. As he recently told the opening session of this year’s online Housing LIN Summit, downsizing from a four-bedroom house means he has no garden to do, and no maintenance to worry about, leaving him plenty of time to use the on-site gym. He walks a mile every morning, around the grounds if dry and through the corridors if wet.
The development is one of 20 retirement villages or schemes run by ExtraCare, all offering care services as needed. Advocates of the housing-with-care model see it as key to easing both the care and the housing shortfalls facing the nation, freeing up general housing as it does. But they say that its growth is being held back by planning obstacles, a lack of enabling legislation and a shortage of funding for provision for people lacking the capital to buy an apartment, but keen to rent.
According to ARCO (The Associated Retirement Community Operators), only 0.6% of people aged 65 and over in the UK live in a community meeting its criteria for an ‘integrated’ scheme, compared to 5.0% in Australia, 5.5% in New Zealand and 6.0% in the US. If provision was increased to support 250,000 people in such schemes, about 2.5%, it claims there would be savings to the NHS and social care of £5.6bn a year.
After years of campaigning, ARCO thought it had achieved a breakthrough last May when the Government launched the Older People’s Housing Taskforce, charged with exploring ways of increasing the supply of specialist housing for people in later life, widening their options and identifying challenges that needed to be overcome. The taskforce was told to report within 12 months and ARCO welcomed the announcement as a ‘watershed’.
As that 12-month deadline fast approaches, however, there are growing fears that the taskforce’s report will be lost in the run-up to the general election and may not be picked up by the incoming administration. There have also been very few indications of what the report will say.
Care Minister Helen Whately was giving little away when she addressed the Housing LIN Summit, organised by the Housing Learning and Improvement Network, which brings together housing, health and social care professionals. She said she was expecting a strong, well-evidenced report and recommendations. ‘I have seen some of the work in progress. It’s excellent stuff, exactly what we need.’
We shall see. But whatever the strength of direction at national level, it’s vital that local leaders do what they can with existing powers and resources to ensure that housing-with-care is a meaningful option for people. And North Yorkshire is showing the way.
Richard Webb, North Yorkshire Council’s Director of Health and Adult Services, told the Housing LIN Summit that the county was taking a deliberately proactive approach to expanding housing-with-care and now had 28 schemes offering a total of 1,540 apartments.
Anecdotally, though with some emerging hard evidence, the cost of accommodating someone with care needs seemed about a third of that of residential care. In another positive, schemes situated in town centres were helping regenerate communities such as Thirsk and Bainbridge.
Looking ahead, Webb said, why not adapt the model for young adults with care needs? Now there’s a thought. They might not thrill to Showaddywaddy covers, of course…
David Brindle is a social care commentator and Chair of Ambient Support. Email: [email protected] X: @DavidJ_Brindle