Meeting the sheltered and extra care housing needs of black and minority ethnic older people

Nearly a quarter of a century ago, Age Concern and Help the Aged Housing Trust produced a report called Housing for Ethnic Elders containing a range of recommendations for addressing ‘housing and related problems among elders in ethnic minorities’. One of these was that ‘housing associations should be encouraged to undertake the development of special provision [for “ethnic elders”]’ (Age Concern and Help the Aged Housing Trust, 1984, p. 12). In 1993 the Federation of Black Housing Organisations (FBHO) published Housing Black and Minority Ethnic Elders, which again highlighted the need to develop ‘special schemes for black and other minority ethnic elders, dependent on local need’ (Jeffery and Seager, 1993, p. 45). The following year, Anchor Housing published The Numbers Game: Black and minority ethnic elders and sheltered accommodation (Jones, 1994). Like the Age Concern and FBHO reports, this contained recommendations on areas such as staffing, lettings, access policies and types of provision. One of the recommendations made was that ‘the aim should be to extend the range of choices available to black and minority ethnic elders, not to push them in a direction in which they may not want to go’ (Jones, 1994, p. 25). Subsequent reports (Patel, 1999; Patel et al., forthcoming) have echoed many of the recommendations of these earlier reports.

Publication Date: 
2008