Norfolk Housing and Support Strategy for Older People
Overall context
The number of people aged 60+ living in Norfolk is projected to increase over the next 20 years, from over a quarter of the total county population to over a third (356,700). Of this group of people who will be over 60, one third will be aged 80 + . That will equate to 10% of the total population of Norfolk. This is the context for the need to plan for changing housing support needs of older people.The development of a Norfolk Housing and Community Support Strategy is a key objective in section 1.3 of Norfolk Older People’s Strategy Living Longer, Living Well. The action plan for Living Longer Living Well was refreshed in 2009 and delivery is monitored by the Norfolk Older People’s Strategic Partnership Board.
Norfolk Supporting People are the lead agency for the development of the Housing and Community Support Strategy
Housing related support for older people - current position
The majority of funding for housing related support for older people in Norfolk comes via the Supporting People programme.Approx. 7,400 older people currently live in Sheltered Housing or Housing with Care (approx. 4.4% of the population aged 65 or over). The support costs for this group of older people amount to approx. £4 million per annum – almost 25% of the total value of all Supporting People contracts for all client groups across the county.
Supporting People fund other housing related services for older people – community alarms; Home Improvement agencies and outreach support services.
Why we need a Housing and Community Support strategy
There are a number of key challenges to be addressed- The projected increase in the number of older people
- Longer life expectancy and therefore within the total number of older people, a wide range of needs
- Aspirations of new generations of older people in terms of where they want to live, type and quality of accommodation, and the type of support they want
- Variations in needs across the county
- The likelihood that there will be limited resources for any additional housing support development in the future
- The need to use existing resources in a more effective way, in particular to develop preventative services to delay or prevent the transition into more costly health or care services. This includes linking the work of a range of agencies and ensuring housing support services complement other services provided to older people
Work to date
In 2007-08 Norfolk Supporting People undertook a strategic review of sheltered housing. This confirmed the importance of the sheltered housing model in Norfolk and laid out a set of principles relating to quality and standards of accommodation. The review also highlighted- the importance of developing a number of other support models which could be used by older people not living in sheltered accommodation
- use of and options for the future use of the sheltered model would need to be set in the context of evidence about the housing related supported needs of older people
- the development of a Housing and Support Strategy for the county along with local plans for each district
- business planning and implementation plan for delivering the strategy
Overall aims
The overall aims of the proposed strategy and implementation plan are to- To deliver a Norfolk housing and community support strategy for older people and a supporting action plan which provides a framework and timescale for the work required from partners
- To rationalise service provision across Norfolk
- To increase choice for service users and personalise services to enable people to live in their place of choice
- To increase the number of service users who can access services from their existing homes
- To support the development of integrated low level preventative support services that can prevent or delay the transfer to higher cost and less independent care services
- To enable the development of new services and/ or remodelling of existing services
- To balance the need for accommodation and non accommodation based services
- To improve performance on National Indicator 142 – Maintaining independence
