Disabled children need safe homes

Having a safe place to live is hugely important for everyone, but among our
clients are many families with disabled children whose need for a safe and
appropriate home is even more important.

Two of our clients are disabled children whose mothers have been fighting
for years to find them a suitable home.

Last month our clients’ application for judicial review against the London
Borough of Islington was unsuccessful. In a judgment which has very
important implications for other disabled children the court found that the
council had not acted unlawfully despite having identified urgent safety
risks to our clients (children with autism) who remained in unsuitable and
unsafe accommodation.

Our clients want to appeal against this decision not just for their own
children but because of the importance of their case for others. In order
to do this they are asking for donations to fund their application for
permission to appeal to the Court of Appeal. Please go to here and
consider donating to help fund this important case.

Families with disabled children often face huge challenges just making sure
that their children have the basic facilities and support they need. Some
families face an even harder struggle to find a place to live where their
children can be safe.

In the current housing crisis it is easy to overlook the fact that there
are some families who have an overwhelming need for suitable accommodation.

We all know that there is an acute shortage of affordable long term
accommodation. Whatever the wider solutions are, most people would expect
children with serious disabilities to be given the very highest priority
for the sort of accommodation that they need.

This simply isn’t happening.

Thousands of disabled children across the country live in homes where they
are denied basics like a bed of their own or a safe place to play. Worse,
the lives of many children are at risk because they live in homes in high
rise buildings, or where their mothers cannot get them into their homes
without walking along unsafe walkways or using balconies which some
children repeatedly try to climb over.

In our work with disabled families and their children we regularly hear
stories like those of N, a little girl with autism who tried to climb down
the waste disposal chute in her 11th floor home, or H, who thinks he is
Spiderman and tries to get onto the balcony which is just outside his
bedroom window. Or there is A, who has learnt how to open the door to the
first floor balcony with only a low brick wall between her and the
playground below.

The M & A families are taking action not just because of the importance to
their own children but because the question of how we provide safe homes
for disabled children is hugely important for other families and the
communities they live in.

More information about their case and their attempt to raise funds for an
appeal can be found here