A sustainable approach to planning housing and social care: if not now, when?

The publication of Supporting People (Department of Social Security 1998) h as given urgency to discussions around needs analysis, planning, user voice and the development of 'normal' housing for people with support needs. Thi s paper explores a project, which aimed to design a collaborative model for identifying supported housing needs. We provide an overview of the researc h background, local imperatives and findings, and point to the probability of increasing conflict between the policy of developing 'sustainable commun ities' and the development of housing for people with support needs.