ISER research to be presented at House of Lords seminar on Meeting the costs of disability and independent living

Lady Campbell of Surbiton, former Commissioner of the Equality and Human Rights Commission and and cross-bench peer, will host a seminar at the House of Lords on 24 June to discuss new research on meeting the costs of disability and independent living. The event will bring together academic researchers, MPs, policy think-tanks, charities and the private sector to explore the early findings of two ESRC-funded research projects:

The closure of the Independent Living Fund: how is it affecting users?

The Independent Living Fund (ILF) will close at the end of June 2015. At the moment, 18,000
disabled people rely on it to pay for the assistance they need to live in the community. For the first 12 months after closure, £262 million will go to local authorities – although money will not be ring-fenced for existing users. Former ILF users are now undergoing local authority assessment and will receive a new funding package, likely to be less than their previous support.

As part of the wider Economic and Social Research Centre (ESRC) ‘Personal Assistance Relationships’ project, researchers at the University of East Anglia are interviewing ILF users about the impact of this policy change. Dr Tom Shakespeare, Senior Lecturer at the university’s Norwich Medical School, will present preliminary qualitative findings about the perceived risks to life in the community for those with personal assistance needs.

Disability in later life: how well do disability benefits and publicly-funded social care meet the costs?

The balance between supporting older people with disabilities through nationally-administered disability benefits (such as Attendance Allowance), or through publicly-funded social care arranged via local authorities, remains a matter of policy concern. It is often presumed that because disability benefits are largely not means tested they must be less well targeted than social care, which is means tested.

Researchers from the Universities of East Anglia (Professor Ruth Hancock and Dr Marcello Morciano) and Essex Professor Stephen Pudney will present findings from an ESRC-funded research project which provides new evidence on the personal costs that older people with disabilities face and the extent to which disability benefits and social care are targeted on those facing the highest costs and/or are least able to afford to meet those costs.

For more information, email disability.research@uea.ac.uk

News

Latest findings, new research

Publications search

Search all research by subject and author

Podcasts

Researchers discuss their findings and what they mean for society

Projects

Background and context, methods and data, aims and outputs

Events

Conferences, seminars and workshops

Survey methodology

Specialist research, practice and study

Taking the long view

ISER's annual report

Themes

Key research themes and areas of interest