Law: Equalities general question

[butnobodytoldme]

Please could you help me?
There is something on a government website on a matter exclusively concerning the near total absence of any UK housing stock which Disabled people can use.

Local Authorities wanted to correct the imbalance by a tweak to Building Regulations, (having discovered that developers manage to dodge their supposed 'obligations' under general planning law)

Ironically, the additional cost, per housing unit, is comparatively trivial, provided everything is designed to be disability accessible right from the developer's first, back-of-envelope ideas. If national building regulations made that the default assumption, the homes would be more pleasant for all, (e.g. a doorway wide enough for a bariatric wheelchair, and wheelchair 'turning circles', are just as useful for furniture removal and children's play.)

Accessible housing also avoids virtual imprisonment of disabled people and reduces or removes much of the need for Health and Social Care services, because accessible housing allows more self-sufficiency.

In essence, the proposal was
a) Shall we make every new home habitable for every potental user,
including disabled people?
b) Should a certain proportion of new homes be permitted to
exclude disabled people from living in them?
c) Should ALL new home designs be permitted to exclude disabled
people?

As legally required, the government's public consultation on the idea correctly presented the Equalities Impact Assessment.
It stated that there was no impact at all, indeed that all options would be positively beneficial

I.E. It is "positively beneficial" to disabled people to have nowhere to live.

How can anyone protest, because if that E.I.A. isn't ultra vires, what is?

Now, if a government E.I.A. stated it is "positively beneficial" for black people to be excluded from having anywhere to live,( or Trans people, or Catholics) it might be possible to know where to protest. But Age, and Disability, are two 'protected' groups which are not protected at all.

(There is of course also indirect Sex Discrimination in anything which makes the work of carers, especially family carers, more difficult, or in some cases makes it necessary at all, since the self-sufficiency of people with disabilities is needlessly removed, by poor housing design, and it is women who disproportionately have to do avoidable 'caring' as a result)

Closed consultation. Raising Accessibility Standards for New Homes. Ministry of Housing,Communities, Local Govt (then) Dept for levelling up, Hsg and Communities (now) published 8.Sep 2020 and the E.I.A still there to read. Unsurprisingly, with a vast lobby of developers allowed a place at the decision making, and with them unwilling to pay an extra penny for anything which they are not forced into, the E.I.A was all the ammunition they required, to carry the day with the option to leave disabled people excluded from housing, since the Equalities Statement was clear: Homelessness is "beneficial" for Disabled People

I deal with both the Equality Act and planning in my work, and am finding this hard to follow. Are any disability charities taking this up and can they get legal advice on a potential challenge?

What I do know is that the EA is not often used in planning law right now so they may be a bit out of their depth.

The EIA did not find that homelessness benefited disabled people. It found that, even without changes, disabled and older people would be positively benefitted because the percentage of new housing that will meet M4(2) will triple, meaning there will be more accessible new homes available.

The issue is with the assumption that M4(2) accessible housing would increase from 10% of new homes to 30% of new homes without any changes to building regulations.

Retaining the status quo means it’s more important to tackle this at the local level as LAs have the authority to insist on M4(2) standards in many cases and this is the way the increase to 30% will be more likely to be met.

(Not that I disagree the government should have changed the regulations, I’m skeptical that even the 30% will be met without significant effort on the part of campaigners. But I do think you totally misrepresent the EIA in your OP).

Is it because the needs of people with disabilities is so varied though?
So while it is possible to apply standards for wheelchair users, there are many other disabilities to consider with individuals needing different solutions.

@Cuck00soup

Is it because the needs of people with disabilities is so varied though? So while it is possible to apply standards for wheelchair users, there are many other disabilities to consider with individuals needing different solutions.

No. The EIA found that disabled people would benefit even if the standard wasn't made compulsory because it was based on the assumption the standards would be incorporated more whether or not they were made compulsory.

It did not find (as your assertion would suggest) that some disabled people would benefit from there being fewer houses reaching the standard.

Thanks Number. I certainly didn’t intend to suggest that the standards should not apply. I was thinking more widely that disability is more than problems with mobility, which it is too often reduced to.

Thank you for the clarification.