Age Friendly and Inclusive Living

At the Home of 2030: Design Competition Launch, an event hosted by the IET in collaboration with BRE and Home of 2030, we spoke to Heather Scotcher, Senior Programme Manager – Homes and Communities at the Centre for Ageing Better, about what age-friendly and inclusive living means and looks like. There are currently 12 million people over the age of 65 in the UK and it’s predicted this number will increase by 40 per cent over the next 20 years, with the number of people over 85 increasing by 72 per cent over the same timeframe.

Heather spoke about the urgent need for age-friendly homes and the benefits well-designed, accessible homes and communities have for people of all ages. The Centre for Ageing Better is co-chair of the Housing Made for Everyone (HoME) coalition, which is campaigning for a change to UK building regulations that would require all new homes to be built to a higher accessibility and adaptability standards, with Building Regulations Part M, Category 2 being mandatory for all new build homes.