Debate contribution: Housing (Amendment) Bill: Second Stage

Debate contribution by Mr Mark Durkan on 21 September 2026.

MLA

Mr Mark Durkan

Party at the time

Social Democratic and Labour Party

Date

21 September 2026

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Private Members' Business

Heading

Housing (Amendment) Bill: Second Stage

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 5743192

Read the official Assembly record

Text

At its heart, this is a small but important proposal. For a parent trying to keep a roof over their children's heads or an individual who has finally reached the point of having to ask for help, the additional 32 days could make a monumental difference. It allows time for people to make alternative arrangements and get necessary arrangements in place. However, I make it clear that while the legislation is, in our view, necessary, it is just one small piece of the required wider response to the housing emergency across the North. It is a small piece of a jigsaw puzzle. Of course, we do need all the pieces to see the whole picture, but we cannot afford to do nothing while we wait for the Minister or a Minister to do everything.

A secure, affordable and suitable home is the foundation upon which people build their lives. It is where children grow up and families find stability. It is a safe space — somewhere older people should be able to live with dignity and security. When people are denied that security, the consequences of homelessness literally spill out on to the streets and across public services, be that through additional pressures on the health budget or our justice system. Housing is the greatest issue of our time and should be treated with the attention that it deserves. We should not be reliant on a private Member's Bill to address elements of housing. That is no disrespect to the legislation, and certainly not to its proposer, whom I commend for his action on it. The Executive have sleepwalked our communities into a housing crisis. They have not heeded the warning signs, and, under the DUP and Sinn Féin, homelessness across the region has increased by 114% in a decade. Now, the DUP will not even cooperate with Sinn Féin — I am not blaming Sinn Féin for that — to stop, or at least slow down, those figures and lives spiralling out of control. Right now, more than 64,000 people are experiencing homelessness across the North, including 19,500 children and young people. Those are lives on hold: thousands of children stuck are in temporary accommodation, with nowhere to do their homework and no facilities for their parents to cook a healthy meal. The lives of others are thrown into complete turmoil as they sink deeper into poor mental health and addiction while unable to access the wrap-around support that they need. The crisis did not happen overnight. It is a result of years of inadequate housing supply, insufficient investment, political delay and a failure to take preventative action when the writing was on the wall. Historically, the response from the Executive has been reactive rather than preventative — waiting until people are homeless before we intervene; and waiting until families are in temporary accommodation before we ask how they got there in the first place. Homelessness prevention service funding was slashed year-on-year. To be fair, the Minister allocated additional resources to prevention. I am sure that he will tell us more about that, but I would like to hear not just how much he allocated but how effective it has been. The same Executive who fail to meet their own targets on social housing development, claiming not to have the funding to do so, manage to pour ever-increasing funds into the sticking plaster that is temporary and emergency accommodation. I understand the concerns that have been raised. We do not want to be in a situation where we are pouring more money into that black hole. It is a black hole: there is a complete lack of transparency and accountability about where all the money goes and how much of it goes where. Last year, £76,500 a day was spent on temporary accommodation. When we take housing benefit spending into consideration, that rises to £109,000 a day. We are talking about a colossal spend with very little oversight, no procurement process in place and very little assessment of value for money. I hope that the Bill will help, in part, to buy more time for those who are threatened with homelessness, but, as they say, prevention is better than cure, and we should be focusing on those at risk long before they reach that point. Certainly, I understand the reservations that the Minister's party has expressed around potential unforeseen circumstances, but, surely, allowing the legislation to progress to Committee Stage, where the issues could be thrashed out and delved into more deeply, would be beneficial.

756 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

Not flagged

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Assessed 21 October 2026 at 16:40 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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