Member's statement: Housing Crisis

Member's statement by Mr Gerry Carroll on 24 June 2025.

MLA

Mr Gerry Carroll

Party at the time

People Before Profit Alliance

Date

24 June 2025

Type

Member's statement

Business

Members' Statements

Heading

Housing Crisis

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 5046508

Read the official Assembly record

Text

The Executive have failed to get a grip of the housing crisis, and, despite talk in the Programme for Government of making housing a priority, the truth is that the Executive have failed to act. Rents have shot up, and the Executive have refused to implement rent controls or rent reductions. Evictions have continued for Housing Executive tenants and those who are in the private rented sector, and the Executive have refused to implement a no-fault eviction ban. One of the most cruel aspects of the crisis is the impact that it is having on children and young people. Whilst the impact that homelessness is having on children and young people is a daily feature of mainstream news in the South, it has been normalised and, quite often, forgotten about in the North. We need to see action from the Executive to address the scourge of homelessness right across our society for everybody, but particularly for our children and young people. I pay tribute to the primary schools that are represented in the Public Gallery and at Stormont today.

They are primary-school children, but they are activists from Edmund Rice schools right across the North. They are here to highlight the impact of homelessness on children and young people. They are from Armagh Christian Brothers' Primary School, John Paul II Primary School in my constituency and St Patrick's Primary School in north Belfast. They are student council members who went out of their way to organise a petition and get people to sign it to show their disgust at the scourge of homelessness in our society. They have already gathered 1,200 signatures, which is a tremendous achievement. They have been working with the Westcourt homeless centre, NICCY and others through a convention on the rights of children perspective and have highlighted the fact that over 18,000 children in the North are homeless, which is completely unacceptable and completely unfair. I welcome them today, and I pay tribute to them for their actions, the petition and the work that they have done and will continue to do. That is, of course, not to forget people who are forced into temporary accommodation. Over 5,000 families are living in temporary accommodation without a permanent, secure place to call home. There are over 5,700 children who are growing up homeless in Belfast alone. Almost half of those children — almost half — live in my constituency of West Belfast. That is disgraceful. The number of children living in temporary accommodation over the past five years should not be normalised, but the figure has doubled over that period. Children's futures and well-being are effectively being destroyed by a lack of safe, secure and permanent housing, and poor housing has a massive impact on mental health, physical well-being, access to education and social and emotional well-being. It should not be up to the people in the Public Gallery, but fair play to them for putting pressure on the Executive and the Minister for their inaction.

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

Assessment

Not flagged

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Assessed 21 October 2026 at 12:52 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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