When an individual experiences a life changing injury, such as a spinal cord injury, where they live can help restore independence and dignity or create daily risk and exclusion. Sami Palmer-Latif, Senior Associate and Cari Sowden-Taylor in our Serious Injury team, explore the difficulties of finding a suitable home for someone living with a spinal cord injury.
The scale of the accessible home issue
In 2020, Habinteg Housing Association research revealed that over 400,000 wheelchair users were living in homes which did not meet their needs. ‘Needs’ can pertain to physical aspects such as external/internal access, circulation, layout, functionality, storage and safety considerations but beyond physical suitability, a home also has intrinsic therapeutic value.
A home is not just a physical space that is occupied. It is a routine maker, a sanctuary, a repository of emotions and memories and place where there is a true sense of belonging. This is in stark juxtaposition with a dispassionate clinical room, far removed from everyday home comforts, devoid of normalcy and surrounded by unfamiliar faces and sounds.
The Spinal Injuries Association (SIA) launched their Accessible Housing Campaign in October 2025. They are working in coalition with other charities, housing associations and partners to demand that the Government make a meaningful commitment to increasing the number of wheelchair accessible homes by mandating it within their National Planning Policy Framework in relation to land use and housing.
If a certain percentage of new homes are required to be built to M4(3) standards (the highest level of accessibility), rather than being optional, the overall provision of wheelchair accessible housing would increase. Between 16 December 2025 and 10 March 2026, the Government consulted in respect of the new National Planning Policy Framework, and they are in the process of analysing the feedback they have received.
The search for an accessible and enduring home in context
For those individuals who are not living in secure accommodation at the time of their spinal cord injury, do not have a source of funding for alternative accommodation, or cannot adapt their existing home to meet their basic needs, they find themselves facing uncertainty and adversity.
Institutional settings provide critical early interventions and management to save and stabilise individuals and provide a level of functional rehabilitation, but this is a protected and structured environment where there are healthcare professionals of all guises under the same roof. Following inpatient discharge, controlled clinical exercises must then translate into everyday contexts and reintegration back into the community. It is at this point that ‘real life’ rehabilitation begins, and a suitable home should be the very anchor for this post traumatic adjustment and growth.
For those who cannot return to their own private dwelling after injury, they may find that to facilitate a ‘safe discharge’ at the time of inpatient discharge from an acute or sub-acute setting, they are allocated a placement in a care home. There is no prerequisite that the care home must have demonstrable expertise in the management of spinal cord injuries and concomitant issues. This means that individuals with a spinal cord injury in this scenario may find themselves living for an indefinite period in a non-specialist environment where they may have no commonalities with the other residents, who, for example, could have entirely different age and morbidity profiles.
Moreover, if the staff themselves are not in receipt of training on essential areas of daily management such as bladder and bowel care, skin management and passive range of movement and stretches, there is a real risk of regression in a person’s wellbeing, both physical and psychological. Without appropriate input to support maintenance of functionality, this could reduce the prospects of other accommodation being secured, and their ‘home’ remains a room in a care home.
Limitations to adaptions of their current home
From an emotional perspective, human instinct may, for some individuals, make returning to their pre-injury home seem an attractive proposition. But if the feasibility of adaptations means that a wheelchair user is only able to access a fraction of the property footprint, then that is no more than nominal access and is not genuinely usable. There is also the challenge of having to manage the ownership of a home which is no longer suitable.
Even for those who have access to funding to facilitate the provision of alternative accommodation, whilst the optimal solution is usually single storey bungalow style, these are usually in very limited supply, as are suitable building plots, and therefore other options must be considered. When it comes to renting properties, landlords are often extremely reluctant to allow their properties to be adapted for a specific disabled occupier, as such works tend to affect the value of their assets and demand for rental properties remains high. In addition, it does not provide the tenant with long term security.
Not enough suitable housing in the UK
No country has a high proportion of wheelchair accessible homes but there are some that do lead by example in various ways. Singapore is widely cited as a benchmark for consistent accessibility standards. It has strong, long-standing mandatory accessibility building standards for the built environment, most newer housing is designed with step-free access, lifts and wide layouts and accessibility is built into public housing at scale. However, in Singapore the vast majority of the population live in apartments that are built by the public housing authority, the Housing and Development Board, and accessibility is planned at three levels at once: the apartment, the block and the estate.
A question put to the UK Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government on 10 April 2026 about whether an assessment had been made of the sufficiency of the level of accessible homes for people with disabilities in the North West revealed that data relating to the number of wheelchair accessible homes is not collected centrally. This is seen all too frequently in a variety of contexts in the UK.
In the meantime, the inadequate fail-safe is the statutory duty of local authorities to provide adaptations for people who satisfy a needs assessment, eligibility criteria and a means test and to contact local counsellors. Despite the differences in populations and accommodation types, the salient lesson from Singapore is that a joined up and holistic approach must be taken to development in the built environment.
Campaign work to reduce the gap
The SIA’s campaign is focused around lobbying for mandatory accessibility standards, inclusion of wheelchair-accessible homes in planning rules and a target of around 10% of new homes being fully wheelchair accessible. It should be remembered that this is in the wider context of a Government pledge to build 1.5 million new homes by 2029. It needs to be realised to reduce the gap in provision now and not viewed as only aspirational.
There are immediate and secondary benefits to such changes being implemented which include greater independence and functionality for wheelchair users, better health outcomes, lower long-term costs compared to retro-fitting homes and reduced pressure on NHS and social care services. It also helps with “future proofing” for an ageing population, meaning more people can age in the same place even as their needs change. The net effect should be that wheelchair access becomes a systematic part of housing policy that helps to promote independence without obstacle, improve quality of life and renew identity.
Our Serious Injury team has decades of experience supporting individuals and families affected by spinal cord injury arising from road traffic collisions, accidents at work and other catastrophic incidents. We have been supporters of the Spinal Injuries Association for many years and continue to work alongside the charity reflecting our enduring commitment to the spinal cord injury community.
We understand that life after spinal cord injury extends far beyond a legal claim itself. Access to suitable housing, rehabilitation, care, equipment and community support all play a vital role in rebuilding independence, identity and quality of life. Supporting the SCI community is therefore at the heart of what we do, and we remain dedicated to helping injured individuals and their families navigate the challenges they face both immediately after injury and in the years that follow.
