Housing

Worryingly for Housing Executive staff, the DUP plans for housing include “breaking up” the executive into a ‘true’ strategic housing authority with responsibility for landlord and development functions. This, the party says, would allow an estimated £3 million of assets held by the Housing Executive to be used to pay for new-builds and the maintenance programme.

The common housing selection scheme would also come under the spotlight as would the VAT level on repairs and maintenance of properties, which the party proposes to reduce.

To counter fuel poverty, a boiler scrappage scheme should be introduced in Northern Ireland while an energy assistance package would also be aimed at vulnerable residents.

Sinn Féin advocates legislation across Ireland which gives people an enforceable right to housing. The common selection scheme would face a change as it “discriminates against people in areas of high demand”.

With its manifesto sticking closely to those matters which do reside at Westminster, the SDLP pledges only to build more social housing, pointing to the job creation which would follow.

Naturally Alliance supports freely available integrated housing, while the Greens say the housing shortage could be dealt with by support for self-builds and improvements to existing stock by promoting energy efficiency.