Malta's first Housing and Community Care Conference

On November 14 the Housing Authority held a one-day conference at the Westin Dragonara Resort on housing and community care.

The aim was to discuss the various issues surrounding housing for particular groups, particularly community homes for persons with disability and the elderly.

The Housing Authority has strongly supported the idea of this type of housing and has assisted a number of NGOs by funding the refurbishment of houses for special needs groups.

The opening address was made by Social Policy Minister Dr Lawrence Gonzi and two keynote speakers from the UK, Denise Brennan and Paul Johnson, spoke about community care in the UK. The morning session concentrated on disability issues while the afternoon focused on housing and the elderly.

Ms Brennan spoke about housing associations, explaining that these have been around for many years and are sometimes chaired by volunteers and overseen by government bodies.

She also discussed legislation and the importance of maintaining standards. Ms Brennan also presented a case study of the Cambridgeshire area.

Joe Camilleri, chairman of the National Commission of Persons with Disability, addressed the need for housing for people with disability. He talked about the fact that aspirations of disabled persons are, thankfully, different from those of a few decades ago.

Nowadays there was a focus on inclusion and many disabled persons were now attending mainstream school and would therefore be in a better position to acquire jobs.

He stressed the importance of the need to house disabled persons who may opt for an independent way of life. Disabled persons were not all in one category, but had different needs and this has to be taken into consideration.

Agency Sapport chief executive officer Marcel Pisani spoke about how in the past many persons with disability were inappropriately housed. In the 1960s, Dar tal-Providenza was opened by Mgr Michael Azzopardi and places were quickly over-subscribed.

The important aspect was that Mgr Azzopardi helped expose the stigma that disabled persons and their families often encountered, leading to many disabled being kept hidden or inappropriately institutionalised.

In recent years we have seen tke opening of Dar il-Wens, Dar il-Kaptan, Dar Nazareth and Arka Foundation in Gozo. The Housing Authority has also put a house at the disposal of Sapport in St John Street, Cospicua. This house will offer accommodation to people with severe disability.

Richmond Foundation CEO Doris Gauci spoke about mental health issues and of the importance of inclusion in the communities of people who suffered from mental illness.

She talked about a scheme set up by the Richmond Foundation which aims to help people with mental illness integrate themselves in the community. One of the biggest problems facing the sector, she said, was that of funding.

Funding that was given to mental hospitals did not automatically move with those clients who went on to live in community homes, and this issue needed to be addressed.

The Housing Authority has placed a number of apartments at the disposal of the Richmond Foundation and these are then used to house people with mental illness, particularly in cases where it is felt that living independently would improve a client's quality of life.

The afternoon session focused mostly on elderly issues and was opened by Parliament-ary Secretary Dr Francis Agius.

Mr Johnson explained how there had been a move away from the typical institutions of yesteryear and that the focus was now on "done with" rather than "done to" or "done for". The idea, he explained, was to involve the elderly in the housing provided for them.

Older people have their own specific problems including hypothermia, lack of nutrition, breathing problems and risk of flooding in homes. These problems can be addressed, he said, by the use of specific installations such as a door entry video system, automatic cooker shut-off device, monitoring if a client has been in the bath too long and so on.

The idea, he said, was to offer alternative housing models for older people.

The trend nowadays was to have different levels of care in housing for the elderly. Some homes, he explained, were equipped with gyms, health spas and pubs - all of this making the elderly feel part of the community.

The Housing Authority also presented its own data on elderly issues and a joint presentation was made by research officer Audrey Ellul and care and repair co-ordinator Roseanne Debono. They gave an overview of the elderly applicants for Housing Authority schemes.

The research indicated that the majority of elderly applicants in the last five years were for home repairs and disability adaptatlons. Elderly applicants for the disability adaptation scheme in fact accounted for 62 per cent of all applications for this scheme, indicating age related mobility/disability problems.

The conference was concluded by Parliamentary Secretary Dolores Cristina.

Ms Micallef Leyson is chairman of the Housing Authority