Clause 2 - Meaning of ''category 1 hazard'' and
Housing Bill
3:15 pm
Mr John Hayes (South Holland and The Deepings, Conservative)
I mean the second of the two examples to which the hon. Gentleman referred. It is important to focus on ability or disability. I am not using the word ''disability'' in the sense that he is assuming that I am. I am not speaking only of disabled people. I am talking about people whose ability or disability in relation to a hazard may impact on their risk. Let us consider an elderly person living in a very well adapted home—perhaps relatively modern accommodation or a bungalow without stairs with all the necessary elements put in place to ensure that the person's life is as safe and convenient as possible. That person is certainly at less risk than a young person in a very old property that, based on the criteria before us today, does not satisfy reasonable modern safety standards. That situation is borne out by the information available to the Committee as well as other information that is available to the whole House. Yet because of the way in which the Government have taken age profile as the key criterion in the people-centred aspect of their approach, that would not necessarily count for a great deal.
I want the Government to come up with a way of measuring ability or disability that allows us to target the guidance at different groups in the population that may be vulnerable. It is true that elderly people are often vulnerable, but many other groups are vulnerable too. It is important that we take account of that when implementing the new methodology. I would make the approach more effective to allow us to target better and make it easier for local authorities to enforce the new standards.
I raised that matter when we were briefed on the subject and spoke to one of the academics involved in drawing up the new guidance. The essence of the response that I received, on which the Minister may want to elucidate, was that because of the complexity of what I have described, it was necessary to pick something to define the people at greatest risk, for the purposes of simplicity and to get something on the record—to make a start, as it were. Age was the thing to choose because, as I said, there is a correlation between age and risk. My worry about that approach is that it will miss out important sections of the population and important people in different communities, so it may be too crude an instrument.