HOUSING We have already referred in the section on poverty to the higher incidence of housing deprivation among the SMD groups. In this section we consider more qualitative aspects of housing which may contribute to or impair quality of life.
Figure 20 looks at two key measures: not being warm enough in winter (often linked to fuel poverty); and the home being in a poor state of repair. In this instance we focus on the Ever SMD(5D) perspective, so we are typically looking at the housing conditions ‘now’ of people who have experienced SMD disadvantages in the past, whether or not they are still experiencing them.
As can be seen, there is generally a very strong relationship between SMD level and both of these problems, with adults with experience of two or more SMD disadvantages having a five to eight times higher risk of being cold in winter and/or
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living in a house in poor repair than those who report no relevant SMD issues. Also note that, with regard to the specific domains, that it is not just those with experience of homelessness who score highly on propensity to have poor current housing quality. Having an offending history and being a survivor of DVA also seems associated with current poor quality housing, suggesting that both of these experiences tend to disrupt and limit housing opportunities and force people to accept poor conditions.
