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Cratus 23

Tasked by retirement home developer McCarthy & Stone, Pagoda PR embarked on a campaign to influence Scottish Government planning policy in response to Scotland’s “demographic time bomb”. The campaign was recognised as the Best Campaign in Scotland at the Public Affairs Awards.

The number of people over 65 is estimated to almost double to 1.4 million by 2035, putting huge pressure on housing, health and social care budgets. At present, Scotland has only 36,000 sheltered homes, just 10% of which are privately owned. Existing policy also didn’t recognise the distinctive requirements of retirement housing.

The resulting campaign led to the Planning Minister in June 2014 publishing new Scottish Planning Policy including provisions for older people’s housing, ensuring that councils must consider sheltered housing in housing needs assessments amongst other requirements.

Lynne Veitch, Account Director at Pagoda PR commented: “We’re extremely proud to be winners of the first national Public Affairs Award for our work with McCarthy & Stone in Scotland. It’s always rewarding when a campaign on important social issues like this is successful, so it’s an added bonus to have our work recognised in the industry. We’re looking forward to helping McCarthy & Stone develop the campaign for older people’s housing in the future.”

Paul Teverson, Director of Communications, McCarthy & Stone added: “Pagoda PR has a detailed understanding of the Scottish policy issues in general and of planning and housing issues in particular. Their help has been instrumental in engaging with the Scottish Government to ensure that Scottish Planning Policy has been changed to help remove barriers to those developers who specialise in providing a range of accommodation for the growing number of older Scots seeking to maintain independent and active lifestyles.”

Improving housing choices for older Scots

Scotland faces a demographic time bomb. The number of people over 65 is estimated to almost double to 1.4million 1 by 2035, putting pressure on housing, health and social care budgets.

However, Scotland only has 36,000 sheltered homes, just 10% of which are privately owned.

Specialist retirement developer, McCarthy & Stone, tasked us with devising a campaign to influence Scottish Government planning policy.

Existing policy didn’t recognise the distinctive requirements of retirement housing. It needs to be close to shops and services (usually expensive, centrally located brownfield sites), requires a high-spec build, with around 30% communal (unsaleable) space, and include support services. These factors mean there’s an uneven playing field when bidding for sites against other developers.

Campaigning for policy change to benefit private sector housing developers wouldn’t be easy. It could be misrepresented as championing developer interests rather than the needs of older people.

Reviewing Scottish Planning Policy (SPP), we found no mention of older people’s housing so we developed campaign proposals including:

  • a partnership approach with government, demonstrating how a policy shift could encourage private
  • investment and relieve pressure on public funding;
  • making the case that all councils must consider older people’s housing in housing assessments;
  • pressing for recognition of the social and economic benefits of older people’s housing and;
  • arguing for an exemption from affordable housing (AH) contributions.

There were huge variations between councils in how AH contributions were applied, despite clear Government guidance. We gathered case studies to demonstrate this including councils that:

  • exempted AH and approved two planning applications in 15 months, delivering 100 new homes;
  • imposed such a high contribution the site became unviable and remains vacant.

Implementation

Developing a persuasive case to engage with Government, key influencers, councils and the media, we:

  • capitalised on media interest in the demographic ‘time bomb’, linking to the Census publication by writing
  • op-eds, blogs and an e-newsletter campaign highlighting the mismatch between numbers of older people
  • and sheltered housing (securing ‘read’ rates up to 87% among politicians);
  • secured a meeting with the Planning Minister immediately following a consultation on a review of the SPP
  • and went armed with a draft policy document (in Scottish Government ‘house style’), showing how older
  • people’s housing could be included in revised guidance;
  • built third-party support with opposition spokespeople, the CPG on Older People and Age Scotland and
  • briefed MSPs to help inform Parliament debates and PQs;
  • invited the Minister to preview and open McCarthy & Stone’s first Assisted Living development in
  • Scotland, to see the benefits first-hand;
  • met with Heads of Planning of Scotland to discuss council variations.;
  • persuaded McCarthy & Stone to exhibit at the SNP Conference where we announced plans to invest £141
  • million in new homes, given the right planning conditions.

On 23rd June 2014 the Planning Minister published the new SPP including provisions (see appendix) for older people’s housing, ensuring that councils must consider sheltered housing in housing needs assessments; prepare policies to support its delivery and allocate sites. Furthermore, a contribution to affordable housing for developers of specialist homes may not always be required.

The objectives for the campaign were fully met.