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CIH: Poll shows support for NIHE development
The Chartered Institute of Housing has called on Stormont to support the Northern Ireland Housing Executive, saying new research shows housing professionals want to see the landlord return to house building.
A CIH survey of 68 housing professionals reveals nearly 80% (54) agree with the idea of the Northern Ireland Housing Executive (NIHE) building new homes.
Nicola McCrudden, CIH Northern Ireland director, said the survey results were “a strong endorsement of the NIHE”. She said: “There is a strong feeling that funding has to be found to regenerate homes and get back to building.”
In 2013, then social development minister Nelson McCausland announced the NIHE would be broken up, with its landlord role transferred to other organisations. However, the future of the NIHE is still unclear following the election in May, after the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) ran on a platform to transfer its stock. The other main party, Sinn Fein, is against the transfer of NIHE stock to housing associations.
Paddy Gray, professor of housing at the University of Ulster, said: “There’s an awful lot of money that could be drawn in on the Housing Executive’s asset base and it would be a very feasible direction for the government to take.”
However, he added that the Northern Ireland Executive would have to change the NIHE’s borrowing restrictions that mean the public body cannot borrow money to fund regeneration or new build work. One respondent said it was “ludicrous that the ‘strategic housing authority’ which manages 89,000 properties” was not able to build. The NIHE’s housebuilding role was transferred to housing associations in the later 1990s and early 2000s.
Just seven respondents said they disagreed with the NIHE retaking its building powers, with a further seven saying they neither agreed nor disagreed.
In a separate question, just one in 10 respondents (seven out of 68) thought the NIHE should undergo a large-scale stock transfer to housing associations.
Nearly half of respondents (31) said the body should be retained in public ownership with increased public funding and 28% said it should be transformed into a social enterprise in order to access private investment.
On Friday, the CIH responded to the Northern Ireland Executive’s draft programme for government, calling on ministers to include targets for housebuilding in the document.
