Debate contribution: Housebuilding on Public Land

Debate contribution by Ms Carál Ní Chuilín on 31 March 2025.

MLA

Ms Carál Ní Chuilín

Party at the time

Sinn Féin

Date

31 March 2025

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Private Members' Business

Heading

Housebuilding on Public Land

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4871612

Read the official Assembly record

Text

There are lots of figures. The Minister probably has them all in his lines to take, and they do not really change much, to be fair. The areas with the worst housing stress have typically been in North Belfast, West Belfast, Foyle, and Newry and Armagh. Undoubtedly, there are needs across the board, but, in North Belfast, which is my constituency and Brian's, housing stress has remained persistently stubborn. There are many reasons for that. The revitalisation of the Housing Executive needs to happen at pace and in conjunction with everything else. More focus needs to be put on that. I want to see the Housing Executive get more land-assembling powers so that it can act almost in a way in which it can look at public land for public housing and take responsibility for and ownership of it, as well as potentially getting other assets in order to build housing. Land is just sitting there in areas such as North Belfast, but it is in private ownership. Private developers are willing to go into partnership, but the obstacles that are put in front of them are horrendous. Kellie Armstrong made a point about NI Water. It is very suspicious that the areas in which, NI Water says, it will hardly ever build are those with the highest need. For example, in Union Street in North Belfast, managed student accommodation of 780 units will go ahead with no opposition from NI Water, but, if we are looking to build houses on the Crumlin Road or elsewhere, there is opposition to that. Why is that? To be frank, I am suspicious. Over 4,500 people are on the housing waiting list for North Belfast. At least 3,800 of them live in housing stress. That is hopelessness that we are passing on from one generation to another. We all deal with families, but we now have three or, at times, four generations of one family living under one roof. Children have no access to privacy, nowhere to do their homework and nowhere to bring their friends. That is absolutely horrendous, and I do not believe that any Minister wants to see that happen on their watch, nor would I anticipate it. We need to be more ambitious in the way in which we deal with the situation. Our local development plans in councils could be one way of doing that. Belfast City Council has certainly led the way in managing land that it has, and it will hopefully get the development status. However, the thing, for me, is the revitalisation of the Housing Executive. Indeed, Ciara talked about ending the right-to-buy scheme, which is currently the case in housing associations but not in the Housing Executive. We need to align that.

I will take the Member's word for that. I cannot remember the full amendment, but I remember that your party removed the ring-fencing of houses in areas of highest housing stress and need. None of us can cover ourselves in glory. The point that I am making is that, collectively, we are dealing with constituents who, across generations, are living with systemic housing stress, and it needs to end. It can end only when there is full participation, including from the collective —.

No, I will not give way again, Mark, if you do not mind. Colin will make a winding-up speech later. I know that the Opposition want the same thing: more houses for families who need them most. Other Members have spoken about rent and everything else, but, at the minute, more children are living in the private rented sector than in the social sector. Those children have no stability and no security of tenure. I know that it is a mammoth task, but we need a housing summit, on behalf of the Executive, to pull everybody together. We need to get our finest and brightest people and people with experience together to see what else we can do, because tinkering from one mandate to another is not cutting it for anyone. I support the motion.

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

Assessment

Not flagged

Jev’s structured answers

Assessed 21 October 2026 at 12:15 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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