This Disability Alliance factsheet briefly outlines the housing grants available in England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. You can find out more detailed information in Disability Rights UK's Disability Rights Handbook, available to buy at www.radar-shop.org.uk/.
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Disabled facilities grants are grants provided by your council (local authority) to help meet the cost of adapting a property for the needs of a disabled person. The scheme operates in England, Northern Ireland and Wales.
To be eligible for a disabled facilities grant, you must be one of the following:
If you are one of the above and applying for the grant for someone else who is disabled you need to state this on your application.
The housing grants, construction and regeneration act 1996 is the main legislation for disabled facilities grants.
You are treated as disabled if one of the following applies:
You can get a grant to help a disabled person:
Disabled facilities grants are normally paid by your local housing authority (your local Housing Executive Grants Office in Northern Ireland) who should provide you with an application form.
You will usually be asked to sign a certificate stating that the disabled occupant will live in the property for at least 5 years after the works are completed, or a shorter period if there are health or other special reasons.
A council cannot refuse to allow you to make a formal application or refuse to give you an application form.
You should not have any work carried out on the property until your council approves the application. If the work is urgent, you should contact the council to discuss this. You will also need to ensure that you separately get any planning or building approval needed.
The maximum grant payable under a mandatory disabled facilities grant is £30,000 in England, £25,000 in Northern Ireland and £36,000 in Wales. The grant will only be paid when the council are satisfied that the work has been completed to their satisfaction and in accordance with the grant approval.
The actual amount of disabled facilities grant that someone can get depends on the income and savings of the disabled person and his or her partner, even if the disabled person has not actually applied for the grant (such as when an application is made by a landlord with a disabled tenant ).
For more detailed information on how disabled facilities grants are calculated see our Disability Rights Handbook.
The income and savings test is similar, but not identical, to the test for income support (IS), or pension credit (PC) if the disabled person is the qualifying age for pension credit or over. In all cases the first £6,000 of any savings are ignored.
If the disabled person's income and savings are below the test limits there will be no need for him or her to contribute to the cost of the works.
If the disabled person's income and savings are more than the test limits, then a contribution will be required from them towards the cost of the works.
Parents income is not taken into account for adaptations for disabled children and young person's under the age of 19.
You may be able to get help under other local authority housing grant schemes. See Other Housing Grants.
A disabled facilities grant is compulsory but in order to approve an application the local housing authority must be satisfied that the works are both "necessary and appropriate" for the needs of the disabled person, and "reasonable and practicable" in relation to the property.
In order to check whether the works are necessary and appropriate, the local housing authority usually refers you to the social services department first for an assessment by an occupational therapist .
There is a 6-month time limit for the local authority/council to give you a decision. This starts from the date of your formal application. Sometimes your local authority may specify a date of payment for the grant but this should be no later than 12 months from the date on which you made your application.
If you do not get a decision within 6 months of applying, write and ask why and request that a decision be made. Seek legal advice if you still do not get a decision, or if you have been prevented from applying in the first place.
For more information see our Factsheet F6 - complaining about local authority decisions
In Northern Ireland you can complain to the Housing Executive.
Under the Regulatory Reform (Housing Assistance) (England and Wales) Order 2002, local authorities have the option to provide financial and other assistance for repair, improvement and adaptation. This is help available in addition to disabled facilities grants.
You can be given help in the form of a loan or grant, equipment or materials or advice. Local authorities can set their own conditions for deciding who gets help. They may, for example, choose whether to look at your income and savings when you apply for a grant.
You can be given help to:
Your local authority must publish a policy explaining what kind of help they may give, who can get it, what information is available, how to apply for it and how to complain. Contact your local housing department to find out more.
Guidance about these powers is contained in Housing renewal circular 05/2003, available from the Department for communities and local government website at www.communities.gov.uk/publications/housing/housingrenewal.
Part 2 of the Community Care (Delayed Discharges etc) Act (Qualifying Services) (England) Regulations 2003 allows the local authority to provide you with an aid, or a minor adaptation to your property as long as it is for the purposes of assisting with nursing at home or aiding daily living. There is no cost for this but the aid or adaptation should not cost more than £1,000.
In Wales there is a Rapid Response Adaptations Programme, which is intended to respond quickly to provide small-scale adaptations to the homes of elderly and disabled people in order for them to continue to live there. The scheme can also provide help if you are leaving hospital or residential care.
You can get up to £350 worth of help for work such as the installation of ramps, rails and hand-grips, a covered way to a toilet, levelling of paths, community safety alarms and other work to make your home safe. The work to your home should be finished within 15 days of the day you were referred to the programme.
The Rapid Response Adaptations Programme is delivered by Care and Repair Cymru (www.careandrepair.org.uk/). To use the scheme you need a referral from your local authority or by a health professional.
You may be able to get help with adaptations as part of a community care package provided by your local social services department. For more information see Delivering Housing Adaptations for Disabled People: A Good Practice Guide, available on the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) website at www.communities.gov.uk.
There are eight housing grants/schemes available in Northern Ireland:
The Northern Ireland Housing executive website has information about these grants schemes at www.nihe.gov.uk.
In Scotland, under The Housing (Scotland) Act 2006, local authorities are allowed to provide grants, loans, subsidised loans, practical assistance and information or advice to home owners for repairs, improvements, adaptations and the acquisition or sale of a house.
If you are a home owner you can get a grant for:
The grant will be 100% of approved costs if the you or a member of your household gets income support, income-based jobseeker's allowance, the guarantee credit of pension credit or income-related employment and support allowance. In other cases the grant will be 80%.
If you are a tenant you can only get a grant or loan for one of the following:
For more information contact your local authority. Guidance for Local Authorities is provided in Guidance on the provision of equipment and adaptations available at http://tinyurl.com/3cnn3mc.
You can get help and information at your local advice centre, such as a Citizens Advice Bureau. You can get more information about where to get personal advice from our Factsheet F15 - Finding a local advice centre, available at www.disabilityalliance.org/f15.htm.
11 April 2011