By Catherine Turner, Resident and Customer Influence Committee Chair, Eastlight Community Homes

Housing is far more than just bricks and mortar. Whether you’re a sector lead, housing professional, supplier, contractor or a resident, we all have a duty to ensure that our social homes and services are safe, secure and supportive of people’s lifestyles.

Put simply, that means providing homes that are accessible and inclusive for everyone, but particularly for those living with disabilities. And while it’s easy enough to say, it can sometimes be difficult for housing associations to deliver.

Inclusivity is one of our values at Eastlight Community Homes, and our partnership with Purple Tuesday, a national organisation championing disability inclusion, has continued to spark our ongoing efforts over the years.

As a founding partner, we’ve worked closely with Purple to review our practices and find new ways to improve disability inclusion for both our staff and our customers – from introducing sunflower lanyards (a sign that the wearer might need additional support) and hosting webinars with BuildEast on hidden and visible disabilities, to recently launching our British Sign Language service for our deaf or hard-of-hearing residents.

Our partnership has led to tangible changes within Eastlight, and last year we celebrated achieving Disability Confident Leader status, the highest award in the government’s disability employer scheme.

While we’re proud to be a disability lead in our region, it’s not the end goal for us. Disability inclusion is an ongoing and everchanging journey, and residents now need more from us to ensure they thrive and live independently in their homes.

One in four (or 16.1 million people) in the UK live with a disability, and meeting these diverse needs is no small task for any housing association.

We all have data on our residents, but what we do with it and how we enable disabled residents to shape our future decision-making is what will really drive positive change.

For example, we know at Eastlight that 77% of our residents have a physical, mental or cognitive condition that affects how they interact with us, and many of them require proactive, supportive and designed services that respect and respond to their capabilities. Following our recent Tenant Satisfaction Measures, we also know that we can do more to respond and tailor our services according to their needs.

This information is crucial for identifying and understanding residents, but it doesn’t give us the solution. And that solution doesn’t need to be a complicated one.

Housing associations, including Eastlight, should prioritise listening to residents with disabilities and commit to acting on feedback to shape long-term improvements.

As social housing residents, that’s a crucial part of what we need – knowing that we’re listened to.

Raising a conversation

As part of Eastlight’s efforts to gain insights from our disabled residents, we spoke to 25 individuals living with a range of physical, cognitive and mental health conditions, asking them about the barriers they face every day, their experiences with us and how we can improve.

We received valuable positive feedback, particularly around our communities, engagement with residents and our focus on disability inclusion, but we also heard some concerns about our level of communication, accessibility of our services and the increasing need for additional home adaptations.

Many of these issues are not unique to Eastlight – they are challenges faced across the whole housing sector – but they have reinforced our determination to do better.

The conversations have since sparked discussions internally to not only enhance our resident engagement, but also to improve communication between Eastlight team members.

Following these interviews, we’ve begun addressing our performance gaps, with key themes shaping our action plan for the coming years.

Moving forward, we’ll be introducing more accessible communication methods for residents; implementing staff training on disability, including autism, anxiety and PTSD; and exploring how we can make our homes more adaptable, from installing ramps to reviewing bathroom suitability.

Following resident feedback, we’ll also be considering hosting some local face-to-face surgeries, helplines specifically designed to support those with disabilities, and taking a more proactive stance against bullying, harassment and antisocial behaviour in our communities.

We know there’s work to be done. But, together with our residents, we’re taking steps in the right direction, with active listening and communication right at the heart.

We hope that Eastlight, alongside others in the sector, will continue to learn, adapt and, critically, build the responsive and resilient services that residents need now and in the future.