AQW 657/17-22

Mr Stewart Dickson
Alliance Party
East Antrim

Tabled Date: 21/01/2020
Answered On Date: 20/02/2020
Priority Written: No

Question:
To ask the Minister for Communities what actions her Department is taking to address housing insecurity.

Answer:

The Department provides funding of up to £855,000 per year to Housing Rights to support members of the public and other housing and advice professionals regarding housing and homelessness issues, including a mortgage debt advice service, and to help bring about improvements in housing legislation, policy and practice.

The Housing Executive has measures in place to deal with a lack of stability of accommodation experienced by an individual or household as a result of issues relating to:

homelessness;

difficulty sustaining a tenancy/ accommodation (in either social or private sector);

affordability of housing;

housing quality; and

community safety and sustainability.

To address these issues the Housing Executive delivers variety of operational and strategic activities including:

Housing Solutions and Support;

The Supporting People programme;

Homelessness Strategy 2017-2022;

Customer Support & Tenancy Sustainment Strategy 2019- 22;

Community Safety Strategy (Working Together for Safer Communities); and

Financial Inclusion Strategy