Agenda and minutes

            Apologies were recorded from Councillors Bradley, Bell, Cobain, Canavan, Maskey and I. McLaughlin.

            No Declarations of Interest were reported.

It was agreed that Party Groups would contact Mr. L. Gunn, Regional Manager,  directly should they wish to arrange meetings with their Party and the NIHE to discuss housing need and demand with the Belfast Housing Solutions Team.

            The Committee was informed that the following representatives of the Northern Ireland Housing Executive (NIHE) were in attendance to provide the annual update on the Housing Investment Plan for Belfast 2023-2026:

Grainia Long (Chief Executive)

Liam Gunn (Regional Manager)

John Gillespie (Belfast Programme Manager)

            Joining remotely:

Andy Kennedy (Asset Management)

Fiona McGrath (Head of Belfast Place Shaping)

Paul McCombe (Area Manager)

Theresa Maguire (Housing Manager)

Anthony McKenna (Housing Manager)

Patricia Rice ( Housing Solutions)

            The NIHE Chief Executive commenced by thanking the Members for their commitment to Housing, she emphasised the importance of the Community Planning Partnership and working together towards meeting the outcomes within the Belfast Agenda 2024 - 2028.  Ms. Long then provided an overview of the following priorities and initiatives within the context of community planning:

•        the NIHE continued to lead the various actions across the theme “Our Place” in the 2024-2028 Action Plan via Housing-led Regeneration;

•        work continues with the Housing Led Regeneration Subgroup that had been established to support collaboration to increase housing supply across all tenures; and

•        the NIHE was continuing to work with its statutory partners, the Council and DfC to look at public sector sites and give consideration to Place Making approaches.

            The Chief Executive then provided a tenure breakdown of the housing across the city. She explained that the Housing Investment Plan (HIP) provided an overview of the housing market in the Belfast City Council area and reflected Community Planning priorities locally. She outlined the tenure breakdown of the 149,210 households in the city with 51% of these homes owner occupied, 23% private rented and 26% social rented.  She advised that, relative to other Councils, there was a lower level of owner occupation in Belfast and higher level of private rental, however, that was not unusual for cities.

            She then provided an overview of Housing Executive spend across Belfast during 2023/2024.  She advised that, of the £347.33m spent, £107.52m related to ‘Investment New Build’, £25.24m had been spent on planned maintenance and improvements, £30.77m on response maintenance, and £23.29m on the Supporting People Programme, which she added was no longer available in the United Kingdom. She also advised that £8.04m had been spent on temporary accommodation with this figure just about meeting the growth and scale of this demand.  She also detailed projected spend for 2024/25, including £37.59m allocated to planned maintenance including stock improvements, £31.60m for response maintenance and £23.74 to Supporting People. 

            The Committee noted that in 2023/24 the NIHE had:

•        Managed over 83,000 social homes;

•        Allocated almost 5,700 homes;

•        Approved 805 disabled facilities grants;

•        Invested £83.88 in Planned Maintenance and Stock Improvement;

•        Started 1508 new social homes;

•        Paid out £470m in Housing Benefit;

•        Invested £304.3m in new build social homes;

•        Provided over 19,000 housing support places to the most vulnerable through the Supporting People Programme and invested £788.75;

•        Sold 355 homes;

•        Completed 85.2% of repairs within target; and

•        Invested approximately £57.9m in Rural  ...  view the full minutes text for item 3.