Contact: Dr Chris O’Leary Email: c.oleary@mmu.ac.uk

Understanding the likely future levels of need, demand, cost, and economic benefit is key to the planning of an effective supported housing sector. Such work presents a number of challenges around using the extant evidence base, modelling available data, and involving current and future service users and organisations representing service users.

This half-day symposium will bring together key individuals from across Greater Manchester to discuss and develop an approach to estimating need, demand, cost and economic benefit of supported housing. It will examine how the existing academic and wider research might be used to inform supported housing strategies, evaluate the completeness and usefulness of available data, as well as discuss potential modelling approaches.

By invitation only. For more information, contact Chris O’Leary at c.oleary@mmu.ac.uk

Programme

2.30pm Welcome, refreshments and networking

3.00pm – 4.00pm Setting the scene. Supported housing in Greater Manchester now and in the future

4.00pm to 4.45pm Breakout sessions:

Scenario planning. How do we identity and account for changes in demand/need, user choice, resources, interaction with wider housing market and economy? This breakout session will discuss scenario-planning approaches as a means of understanding the wider context that would need to be accounted for in research around future need, demand and cost of supporting housing across Greater Manchester.
Data. What data are available to help estimate need, demand and cost of supported housing in the future, and what issues might be faced in using these data. This session will discuss data and data analysis, data sharing, gaps and limitations, and how any future research around need, demand and cost of supported housing might account for these data issues.
User engagement. Supported housing covers a range of different accommodation forms, support levels, and client groups. This session will discuss how and in what ways users and future/potential users of supported housing should be involved, engage and take a lead in any research around future need, demand and cost of supported housing across Greater Manchester.
Challenges. This session will identify and discuss challenges might be faced in undertaking research in this area, and how might these be resolved.

4.45pm to 5.00pm Coffee/tea break

5.00pm to 5.45pm Plenary: Roadmap. The four breakout sessions will each feed back and collectively discuss the appetite for this research across Greater Manchester, whether this should/could be progressed, and what needs to happen to make this a reality.

5.45pm to 6.00pm Closing remarks

For more information, please contact:

Chris O’Leary · c.oleary@mmu.ac.uk