Supported Living
Many people take choosing where to live and who to live with for granted, yet it’s a fundamental part of feeling in control of your life. With Hft supported living, we support people with learning disabilities to live however and wherever they choose, often helping them move from residential care or family homes into their own place or a house shared with friends.
We can then provide support in a way that suits each individual, whether that’s round the clock, or by dropping in to help with shopping and cooking, or perhaps helping with the bills.
Finding a home
Moving into your own home for the first time?
We’ll support you in finding accommodation with local housing associations or private landlords that’s already suited to your needs, or can easily be adapted to meet them.
We’ll also help to make sure you understand the details of your tenancy agreements and paying rent. We can support you to move, and to work out what support you’ll need to live in your own home.
Housing
Hft has a dedicated housing department that manages our supported living tenancies, and also acts as a management agency for third party landlords.
We can offer different services: –
- Hft can lease properties from Private Landlords and Housing Associations, which allows us to offer them as supported living services for people we support.
- Hft can also purpose-build houses that can be used for specialist services, such as Ryeford Court, our autism and dementia-friendly service in Gloucestershire, or Corunna Close, our Prader Willi service in Cambridgeshire.
We can also support people with learning disabilities and their families to find appropriate accommodation to lease directly from a Housing Association or a Private Landlord. Our regional teams can support and advise on what is affordable if the person in question is eligible to claim housing benefit.
Staffing
Finding the right staff is important. It’s not just about finding someone that does a good job, but finding someone who ideally shares the same interests and enjoys the same things as the person they’re supporting – someone that they’ll like spending time with.
We also take the time to make sure that our staff are fully trained in person-centred active support so that they’re able to help the people they support enjoy higher levels of inclusion, independence and choice. It’s a style of support that we know leads to great outcomes for the people we support.
Personal care
We’re registered as a domiciliary care provider, meaning we can provide personal care in people’s own homes. We take the standard of care and support we offer very seriously, which is why all our supported living accommodation is run to meet the standards set out by the Care Quality Commission (CQC), who regulate care provision in England.
See the ratings our registered services have received from the CQC.
Independence
We work closely with the people we support to identify any opportunities to help them live more independently, safely and easily. This might take the form of personalised technology, whether through a gadget that reminds you to close the fridge door, or a finger print lock that means you don’t have to worry about forgetting your keys when you pop to the shops.
Our experience shows us that when the people we support are able to do things without assistance, they feel more in control of their own lives and are more likely to become active members of their community.
Involvement
All of us should have a say in the decisions that affect our lives. However, as one of the most excluded groups in society, learning disabled adults are often overlooked.
That’s why our approach to involvement is underpinned by our commitment to putting the people we support at the heart of everything we do.
For us, involvement means:
- Enabling the people we support to shape your own support, exercising more control over your lives and experiencing greater levels of inclusion, independence and choice.
- Providing good opportunities for the people we support to shape our services and the organisation, drawing on your own experiences to inform what we do and continuing to drive quality improvement to live the best lives possible. We do this by involving the people we support in the recruitment and development of our staff and volunteers. Through our local and national speak out groups – ‘Voices to be Heard’ Through feedback and consultations. And, by working alongside the people we support on fundraising events and initiatives.
- Strengthening the voices of the people we support to play a central role in our campaigns and policy work, so that you can influence decision makers both locally and nationally. Our speak out group for the people we support, Voices to be Heard, has played a central role in our Walk in Our Shoes Network. In our responses to government consultations and in discussions with Ministers. On an international stage by giving evidence to the United Nations on the review of the UK government on their progress towards implementing the Convention for the Rights of People with Disabilities.
- Supporting opportunities for self empowerment so involvement is led by learning disabled people as much as possible.