By Gary Bourlet, Membership and Engagement Lead – with video interviews from Jodie Williams and Jordan Smith
Learning Disability England has been working together with Housing LIN in 2020 on housing options for people with learning disabilities.
Together we have made a report called ‘Finding our own way home’. Learning Disability England and Housing LIN will be sending out this report in our weekly newsletter and social media.
We will also be sharing this report with policymakers.
We took these findings from workshops that we did with people who have ideas and experiences on housing choices, to find out their views and experiences.
I think it’s really important that people with learning disabilities have a choice of types of housing they can live in. They should be able to choose whether to live alone or with another person, in supported living or independent and the area they live in.
They must be able to decide themselves whether it will work for them. People with learning disabilities often don’t get to be involved in the decision making.
I think it’s also important that we get more people with learning disabilities out of long stay hospitals, ATU’s and Residential homes where possible and back into the community in housing that is suitable. The money needs to be available to do this.
As part of this work on housing options I have also spoken to Jordan and Jodie on what is important to them in choosing a home. You can see these short videos below…