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Purpose Comment on the contribution that housing can make to delivering better health and wellbeing outcomes. More specifically, the purpose of this paper is threefold: summarise recent evidence that makes the case for housing in helping to address health and social care issues; comment on the challenges and opportunities of partnership working; and describe examples of interesting and innovative local joint provision.Design/methodology/approach Draws on the author's briefing papers on housing, health and social care for housing quality network, which is a national housing consultancy organisation as well as the author's role as Chairperson of East Midlands Housing Care and Support, which is a regional housing association.Findings Collaboration between housing, health and social care is making slow progress at the national level in England. This is despite an ever-increasing evidence base highlighting that good housing can help to address issues, such as delayed discharges. Nevertheless, there are an increasing number of interesting examples of successful local initiatives on housing, health and adult social care. The way forward is to facilitate joint working at a local level.Originality/value Focusses on the success of examples of local joint working between housing, health and social care to achieve better outcomes for vulnerable people. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Accessible summary • This paper is about a workshop held by researchers from the University of Leeds. • The researchers looked at one area to see if people were doing things about health that the Government said they should in Valuing People. • The research found out that there is still a lot of work to do in the area to meet these targets. People came to a workshop to talk about this. They thought that: • Learning disability services should lead the way and draw up a plan about what needs to happen. • People who run health services should make sure they set targets for GPs and hospitals that fit in with the plan. • Government should make sure that the targets they set for GPs also fit in with Valuing People targets. • This research is important because it can show what helps health services improve for people with learning disabilities and what gets in the way. Research at the University of Leeds has evaluated how well changes to healthcare proposed in the Government White Paper Valuing People ( Department of Health 2001 ) were being implemented in one locality and their impact on people with learning disabilities. The project had a developmental aspect and incorporated two workshops over the course of the study to disseminate preliminary findings. These were used to help key stakeholders evaluate progress and to inform discussions about what should happen next in the fieldwork area. This paper discusses recommendations from the first research workshop at which preliminary findings from the study were presented. The workshop involved health and social care providers and managers, people with learning disabilities, voluntary and community organizations. It gives an overview of local issues relevant to the White Paper health targets and highlights those that need to be resolved before these targets can be achieved. These issues are likely to be replicated in other areas of England and Wales and have implications for leadership, strategy, the allocation of resources and structures of accountability in health and social care agencies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores non-legal spaces in which the right to health is invoked. Consideration is given to the potential for creating spaces in which people who are mobile can access health care services, as well as engage with services and activities related to the underlying determinants of health in order to overcome inequities in health. The aims of the research were to explore: service user and provider perceptions of the right to health; the role of individual and collective agency in a partnership approach to health; and the development of a framework of sites for health rights. Interviews and participatory diagramming and visualization were conducted with service users and providers and participant observation was undertaken at two hostels. It was found that there needs to be greater clarity of entitlements for service users as well as responsibilities for those with a duty to protect, respect, and fulfil the right to health. As public space becomes more regulated, hostels are becoming one of the few places which homeless people can transform to use as sites for addressing violations of health rights, for self-advocating for health rights, and for engaging with services advocating on their behalf. It is necessary to ensure that spaces in which the right to health can be invoked are acceptable and appropriate to those who seek to claim the right to health in these spaces. Where the spaces are unacceptable or inappropriate, the spaces can become sites against rights, rather than sites for rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives. There has recently been much emphasis on the role of `partnerships' between local community `stakeholders' in strategies to redress health inequalities. This paper examines obstacles to participation in such partnerships by African-Caribbean lay people in local initiatives to improve mental health in a town in southern England. We present a `social psychology of participation' which we use to interpret our data. Our work seeks to illustrate some of the micro-social mechanisms through which social inequalities are perpetuated, using Bourdieu's conceptualisation of the role played by various forms of capital (economic, social, cultural and symbolic) in perpetuating social inequalities. Design. Our empirical research consists of a qualitative case study of attitudes to participation in mental-health-related partnerships in a deprived community. In-depth interviews and focus groups were conducted with 30 local community `stakeholders', drawn from the statutory, voluntary, user and lay sectors. Results. While interviewees expressed enthusiasm about the principles of participation, severe obstacles to its effective implementation were evident. These included severe distrust between statutory and community sectors, and reported disillusionment and disempowerment within the African-Caribbean community, as well as low levels of community capacity. Moreover, divergent understandings of the meaning of `partnership' suggested that it would be difficult to satisfy both community and statutory sectors at once. Conclusions. We suggest that disadvantaged and socially excluded communities are often deprived of the social resources which would provide a solid basis for their participation in partnerships with state health services. In the absence of efforts to remove such obstacles, and to generate the necessary resources for participation, partnerships may be `set up to fail', leaving social inequalities to prevail. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The New Labour Government in England is seeking to promote public/private partnerships in health and social care as a key component of its political project. This article reports the findings from the first phase of an ongoing qualitative research study exploring the relationship between a private sector company and their public sector partners at four study sites. These findings indicate that organizations within the NHS do not view the development of public/private partnerships as a priority and furthermore currently have a limited ability to engage in strategic planning with the private sector. The findings are explored in the broader context of the evolution of 'managed competition' in health care systems and the role of partnership in that process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]