The Housing Authority has extended the assistance offered to persons with a disability under Scheme 7.

Under this scheme, persons with a disability or families with a disabled member living with them, can apply for assistance for adaptation works, including general alterations and the installation of stair lifts and lifts.

While over the past year assistance for the installation of lifts was granted under this scheme only to persons living in privately owned homes, the Housing Authority has decided to grant assistance also to residents of privately owned apartments.

Accessibility can be a major obstacle for the disabled, including older persons who suffer from disabilities due to old age. With its policies, it said, the Housing Authority aimed at encouraging independent living and therefore offered help in different ways. The installation of lifts was a very important component of this policy.

Until last year this concerned mainly persons

with mobility problems living in government buildings, where since 2002 a total of 80 lifts have been installed in existing blocks with costs amounting to Lm1.3 million (EUR 3.03 million). All new blocks built by the Housing Authority shall be accessible to everyone where this is technically possible and lifts are installed, whether the blocks will be allocated under the Shared Ownership scheme or rented out.

The grant for which residents of privately owned apartments can now apply under Scheme 7 is means-tested and varies, depending on the number of units in the respective housing block. The maximum granted amounts to Lm2,500 (EUR 5,823.43), a sum that divides itself into Lm2,000 (EUR 4,658.75) for the lift installation and Lm500 (EUR 1,164.69) for the construction of the shaft.