The housing crisis in Belfast, fuelled by the cost of living crisis, is worse than ever. Business as usual has failed, with millions in public funds going every year on short-sighted strategies which primarily benefit landlord groups and private developers while promoting economic growth that potentially harms the environment and undermines human rights and equality.
If elected you can act to support a more inclusive and sustainable development model.
Help change how the council does business
2022/23 was a ‘record year’ for the delivery of new social homes, with over 1,449 reportedly completed in Northern Ireland. At this ‘record’ rate it would take over 30 years to build homes for the 44,000+ families on the social housing waiting list. One in three of these households are in Belfast. Since 2010, an average of 941 social homes have been built annually; at this (more likely) business as usual rate, it would take over 50 years to respond to the current need. By any reasonable measure, the housing system has failed, with more people impacted than ever before.
Unless councillors support changes today many of your constituents and their children in the future…
will live in a segregated society
will never be able to afford to buy their own home
will be in debt to banks and landlords for most of their lives
will be spending an ever-increasing proportion of their income on private rent
will spend many years on never ending social housing waiting lists
will live in unregulated housing with potentially ever more unfit conditions
will live in emergency, temporary or contingency accommodation
The solution to a lack of housing supply is to build more housing where it is needed
Elected representatives at all levels must cooperate to raise the targets for new social housing development. Councils must facilitate the use of land and resources to deliver sustainable homes. There are many examples to draw inspiration from locally and internationally, including the Take Back The City Campaign. Ideas are not in short supply, developers want to build and the policy and finance frameworks exist to make it happen. What is required is the local political will to re-direct the institutions of government and officials to prioritise using public and private land to deliver new social homes.
“Twenty-five years on from the Good Friday Agreement, segregation and religious inequality not only persist but drive current racial divisions, separation and housing policy”
The former housing Minister, Deirdre Hargey MLA set an admirable target of 100,000 new homes within 15 years; however this target cannot be met in the absence of a strategic plan to use existing land and resources to increase social housing supply. What we have seen instead, while organising with families in housing need and tracking policy developments, is a failure to activate public land to build social homes in areas of high demand and a disregard for human rights and equality obligations by Council, the Housing Executive and the Department for Communities. In the face of inadequate supply and ever growing demand, the latest policy responses deepen dependence on an unaccountable private sector and downplay the extent of and emphasis placed on housing need. Twenty-five years on from the Good Friday Agreement, segregation and religious inequality not only persist but drive current racial divisions, separation and housing policy.
A sustainable, inclusive way forward
Take Back the City was formed to develop sustainable solutions to Belfast’s housing crisis. We are families in housing need supported by experts in architecture, urban planning, housing policy, technology, finance, communications, permaculture, human rights and equality. We believe we can work together with council to help build a better Belfast - a city that’s not divided by walls, where everyone has a home and the things that really matter are society’s priorities - family, community, environment, health and happiness.
Over the last five years we have led a participative process of community organising, land mapping and design rooted in sustainable development criteria developed by people in housing need from all communities in the city of Belfast. Our recent international design competition and community consultation to choose a winning design plan had an overwhelmingly positive response.
Shortlisted designs were open for public feedback and voting from 21 October 2022 to 23 March 2023, online and at public events attended by over 850 people. The NI Opera ‘Nobody / Somebody’, inspired by the Take Back the City campaign for homes on Mackies, debuted in March 2023 at Elmwood Hall, Belfast and was attended by over 500 people. The website was visited over 4,000 times during the course of the competition, 1,195 votes were cast online and 406 comments were submitted by visitors.
By comparison Mary Dellenbaugh-Losse, consultant for Belfast City Council’s controversial Forth Meadow Community Greenway, reported that council’s consultation reached “more than 300 stakeholders and residents through purely digital engagement methods”. The winning design for Mackies integrates a green way seamlessly without undermining the rights of homeless families to benefit from the use of public land.
We hope you can pledge to support the Take Back The City campaign if elected on the 18th May, and to work with families in housing need and the relevant statutory agencies to explore how our plans can be progressed in line with Council’s existing climate goals and stated objectives to provide an additional 31,600 new homes in our city, for 66,000 new workers, by 2035
We wish you the very best with your election campaign.