Disabled Facilities Grant

These are grants which can provide facilities which make a person with disabilities more mobile or comfortable within their own home.

What are they for?

In the council's district, Disabled Facilities Grants (DFG's) are available to provide essential adaptations to a property to allow a disabled person better freedom of movement around their home, and also to provide essential facilities within it. Grants are subject to a £25,000 limit. 

Who can apply?

If your community Occupational Therapist has recommended to this Council that you might benefit from a DFG, you should complete the Preliminary enquiry form.  An applicant must be an owner or a tenant of the property, even if this is not the disabled person for whom the works are required. A landlord can also make an application on behalf of a disabled tenant.

You can download the form in Adobe PDF format below:

Owner Occupiers & Tenants Application   (17k)

Landlords Application   (12k)

  
How much will I pay ?

The grant application is subject to a means test.

 What kinds of work can I get a grant for ?

Mandatory Grant

If you are disabled, grant is mandatory for essential adaptations to give you better freedom of movement into and around your home and to access essential facilities within it. Where necessary it can also provide the essential facilities themselves. The types of work are:

• To make it easier to get into and out of the dwelling by, for example, widening doors and installing ramps;
• Ensuring the safety of the disabled person and other occupants by, for example, providing a specially adapted room in which it would be safe to leave a disabled person unattended or improved lighting to ensure better visibility.
• To make access easier to the living room;
• By providing or improving access to the bedroom, and kitchen, toilet, washbasin and bath (and/or shower) facilities; for example, by installing a stair lift or providing a downstairs bathroom;
• To improve or provide a heating system in your home which is suitable to the needs of the disabled person;
• To adapt heating or lighting controls to make them easier to use; and
• To improve access and movement around the home to enable the disabled person to care for another person who lives in the property, such as a spouse, child, or another person for whom the disabled person cares.

Discretionary grant

The council has discretion to give grants for a wide range of other works to make a home suitable for a disabled occupant's accommodation, welfare or employment needs. Such works can include providing a safe play area for a disabled child or providing or adapting an existing room to enable a housebound disabled person to work from home. The council also has discretion to give a grant for works that qualify for mandatory grants where the cost would exceed the grant limit for such grants. The council will be able to advise you further about these possibilities.

The Next Step

If your Community Occupational Therapist has recommended to the Council that you might benefit from a Disabled Facilities Grant, you should complete the relevant Preliminary Enquiry form. We will assess the form and contact you direct. To request the preliminary application form, click here, or download and print the forms (above).  If you do not have an Occupational Therapist, but you think that a grant may be appropriate for you, you should contact the Independent Living Services team at Cheshire County Council Social Services on 01244-603634.

The Department of Transport, Local Government & the Regions has compiled an online information booklet on Disabled Facilities Grants  (External Link).