I set out below this Associations
response to your consultation initiative, following my attendance at the event
you organised last week. Thank you for inviting
The timescale for response is
regrettably too short for meaningful discussions to have taken place under our
existing service user consultation arrangements. Hanover Scotlands
experience however is that there is a settled expectation amongst residents to
whom it provides a service that their developments are essentially, if not
exclusively, for those of normal retirement age and above.
Local authorities are the main
commissioners of our services. As such their views are essential to full and
effective consultation.
Viewed from Hanover Scotlands own perspective, the age profile of our residents
generally is rising and the 60 years cutoff, which we
broadly apply across our rented sector and at nearly all owner occupied
developments we manage, is in practice less of an active criterion than it may
have been in the past. The age criterion for rented developments, and at some owner
occupied developments depending on their title conditions, is in any case
subject to exception for suitable younger applicants in need of support
although in practice this has led to very few occupancies being granted to date
to younger applicants. A reluctance amongst younger people to live in a
development occupied almost exclusively by much older residents has perhaps
tended to keep down the numbers of such instances.
Age related occupancy restrictions
are generally set out or referred to in the title deeds of owner occupied
sheltered and retirement developments. You asked about Scottish statutory
provisions with a potential bearing, and may wish to take advice on the impact
of the Title Conditions (
David Reid
Housing Services Manager
Housing and Care Services
Department