INTERNATIONAL HOUSING ACCESSIBILITY
Housing New Zealand is not alone in recognising that housing accessibility is important and needs to become a fundamental component of current and future residential housing planning. Internationally, recent research demonstrates the effects of poor housing accessibility, or an absence of housing accessibility, on people’s functional abilities and quality of life.
The World Health Organization’s (WHO) 2018 Housing and Health Guidelines[i] draws on systematic reviews to assess a range of factors that can adversely affect housing quality. The priority factors WHO considers are:
- household crowding;
- high indoor temperatures;
- low indoor temperature and insulation;
- injury hazards; and
- housing accessibility.
The presence of any of these factors in a home can have negative effects on the general liveability of the home, and the health, safety and quality of life for a home’s occupants and visitors.
WHO’s focus on housing accessibility is about how suitable a home is in terms of its design, construction and any adaptations for its occupants, particularly those with functional impairments.[ii]
The WHO Housing and Health Guidelines identifies that poor housing accessibility has health, economic, and social consequences. These consequences can be seen at an individual household level, where occupants with functional impairments are at greater risk of injury, including falls, stress and isolation. The quality of life for household occupants with functional impairments can also be negatively affected because of poor housing accessibility. People may experience restrictions in social participation, and they may have greater reliance on caregivers and external social services.[iii] In the wider societal context, people with functional impairments are “more likely to be discriminated against when looking for housing, and more likely to pay high costs for housing relative to their income”.[iv]
Conversely, WHO’s systematic literature review found that “[p]eople with functional impairments living in accessible home environments have better health and are better able to accomplish everyday tasks and manage living independently than those living in conventional or inaccessible home environments”.[v] Importantly, the more liveable and suitably accessible a home is, the greater the likelihood a person with functional impairments living in such a home will have a better overall quality of life, including better mental health, and face fewer barriers in their day-to-day life. This is especially significant because, as the WHO Housing and Health Guidelines point outs, “[c]hildren, the elderly, and those with a disability or chronic illness are likely to spend most of their time at home, and are therefore more exposed to health risks associated with housing”.[vi]
WHO makes a strong case that, based on the current and projected national prevalence of populations with functional impairments and taking into account trends of ageing, an adequate proportion of the housing stock should be accessible to people with functional impairments.
WHO’s Health and Housing Guidelines sit within a wider international context. The overarching international document about disabled people is the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD), effective from May 2008. There are 162 signatories to the UNCRPD, and 177 member states have also ratified the UNCRPD. New Zealand is both a signatory to the UNCRPD and has ratified it.
The UNCRPD has eight guiding principles. Within principle 8, which is about accessibility, article 9 reads that accessibility is about enabling:
persons with disabilities to live independently and participate fully in all aspects of life…., [that] persons with disabilities [have] access, on an equal basis with others, to the physical environment, to transportation, to information and communications, including information and communications technologies and systems, and to other facilities and services open or provided to the public, both in urban and in rural areas. These measures, which shall include the identification and elimination of obstacles and barriers to accessibility, shall apply to, [among other things]:
- a) Buildings, roads, transportation and other indoor and outdoor facilities, including schools, housing, medical facilities and workplaces.
NEW ZEALAND HOUSING ACCESSIBILITY
In New Zealand, the New Zealand Disability Strategy 2016-2026 and its associated Disability Action Plan 2019-2022 are the key documents that put the high-level principles and obligations of the UNCRPD into context for New Zealanders and the society we live and work in. Outcome 5 in the New Zealand Disability Strategy focuses on accessibility, and specifically sets out that disabled people have “access to warm, safe and affordable housing that meets our needs and enables us to make choices about where we go to school or work and to fully participate as members of our families, whānau and communities”. The New Zealand Disability Strategy makes clear it is also vitally important that disabled people are “consulted on and actively involved in the development and implementation of legislation and policies concerning housing (home ownership, social housing and private rentals)”.
The New Zealand Disability Action Plan 2019-2022 takes the Outcomes in the New Zealand Disability Strategy and turns them into measurable actions, with both government agencies and non-governmental agencies, for example, the Disabled Persons Organisations Coalition, working together on agreed activities and programmes of work. Accessibility, including housing accessibility, has been identified by Ministers and the Independent Monitoring Mechanism as a ‘key issue’ for inclusion in the refresh of the Disability Action Plan (2019-2022).
Both the New Zealand Disability Strategy and the New Zealand Disability Action Plan are important ways for the Independent Monitoring Mechanism to monitor New Zealand’s compliance with the UNCRPD. The Independent Monitoring Mechanism is made up of the Human Rights Commission, the Ombudsman and the Disabled Peoples Organisations Coalition, and has a collective mandate for New Zealand meeting its obligations under the UNCRPD.
Other related work across New Zealand’s public sector includes the:
- Ministry of Social Development’s draft Better Later Life Strategy He Oranga Kaumātua 2019-2034, which is due to be finalised late 2019. Housing was the most mentioned theme arising from the first phase of consultation. The draft Strategy identifies that steps are required to (among other things) encourage the development of a variety of accessible housing with good access to public transport and services to accommodate the diversity of older people; encourage the use of universal design in new builds so housing is accessible, safe and functional for all life stages; and provide sufficient public and community housing suitable for older people, with appropriate support.
- The Ministry of Social Development’s accessibility work programme, which will consider how to define ‘full accessibility’; the challenges and opportunities of different approaches; and whether legislation is needed for mandatory codes and standards for accessibility and what domains any codes and standards might cover.
- Ministry of Health’s Enabling Good Lives pilot programme, which is about giving disabled people and their whānau greater choice, control and flexibility over where and how they live. The programme is also about access to information and support to enable well-considered choices about where and how disabled people choose to live and receive support, and disabled people gaining increasing independence and choice supported by service providers. The Enabling Good Lives pilot programme’s principles are about:
- Self-determination – Disabled people are in control of their lives.
- Beginning early – Invest early in families and whânau to support them; to be aspirational for their disabled child; to build community and natural supports; and to support disabled children to become independent, rather than waiting for a crisis before support is available.
- Person-centred – Disabled people have supports that are tailored to their individual needs and goals, and that take a whole life approach rather than being split across programmes.
- Ordinary life outcomes – Disabled people are supported to live an everyday life in everyday places; and are regarded as citizens with opportunities for learning, employment, having a home and family, and social participation - like others at similar stages of life.
- Mainstream first – Disabled people are supported to access mainstream services before specialist disability services.
- Mana enhancing – The abilities and contributions of disabled people and their families are recognised and respected.
- Easy to use – Disabled people have supports that are simple to use and flexible.
- Relationship building – Supports building and strengthening relationships between disabled people, their whānau and community.
- Government’s wellbeing approach, for example its 2019 Wellbeing Budget
Some lessons to be drawn from the list above are:
- there are likely to be increasing demands on Housing New Zealand as a provider of public housing
- the economic and social costs and benefits of such interventions will be borne much more widely than Housing New Zealand, which suggests that a cross-agency approach to policy, planning and funding is appropriate.