At the time of writing, we are just over halfway through November. The clocks have gone back, the days are shorter, nights are longer and memories of early autumn heatwaves and Indian summers are rapidly fading, replaced by that all too familiar bracing nip of an encroaching winter in Northern Ireland.
It doesn’t take many years of experience in this part of the world to know what’s in store over the next few months, everyone knows the routine. Longer nights lead to higher electricity costs, colder days to increased fuel costs and the festive season to more costs in general.
Many will have been anticipating the winter spike in necessary outgoings, and some will have prepared. However, for an ever-increasing number of people, this winter will be different. It will be particularly brutal. For them, the opportunity to prepare for the winter costs is a privilege that has simply not been afforded to them in a 2023, which has been accompanied by the harshest cost of living crisis in a generation.
Housing Rights knows this because our clients who call our helpline every day for advice and assistance tell us so. For one cohort in particular, tenants in the private rented sector, this has been a particularly devastating year.
2023: A year of unprecedented costs
As we near its end, let’s take a look back at 2023. We have witnessed food inflation reach a peak of 19.2%, energy prices remain 60% higher than in 2021 and interest rates sit at 5.25%, the highest rate since 2008.
Rent price increases in Northern Ireland peaked at 10% in March and are still rising at a rate of almost double that in England, Scotland and Wales. In 2020, the average monthly rent in Northern Ireland was £657. By 2023, it had increased to £810.
For renters, in rental costs alone, that amounts to paying over £1,800 a year more than they were three years ago. If we put this in the context of the additional, relentless cost increases across society as outlined above, a clear picture emerges of people being driven into poverty, into destitution and into homelessness.
The numbers bear this out and more. They tell the story of a live and real housing crisis in Northern Ireland. There are over 45,000 households on the social housing waiting list.
In 2022, almost 10,000 households were accepted as statutorily homeless, including almost 7,000 children. Over 5,000 of these households were categorised by the Northern Ireland Housing Executive as vulnerable. 18% of households were homeless because of loss of rented accommodation and we anticipate this number growing in the 2023 figures. NIHE has stated that so far in 2023, there have been over 10,000 placements in temporary accommodation.
Local Housing Allowance: A necessary short-term fix
The numbers are demonstrative of an urgent crisis, one that requires immediate political attention. Behind every single one of these statistics is a household. Real people with families, ambitions, responsibilities, problems and dreams for themselves and their loved ones. Each one of them deserves a safe, sustainable home and each one deserves better than the raw hand they’ve been dealt by the failure of politicians to recognise, let alone address this crisis.
The consistent failure to build enough affordable homes is a contributing factor to this crisis and one that cannot and will not be addressed in the next few months. This is true for both the UK Government, which has failed to prioritise the building of new homes, and for Northern Ireland, where the lack of an Executive and insufficient funding for the Department for Communities has resulted in consistently missing housing targets. More affordable homes are the long-term solution, the sustainable solution.
The lack of affordable housing forces low-income households to remain in the private rented sector, where they are powerless to avoid the worst effects of the financial crisis as we enter the winter freeze.
The UK Government, however, has the power to address a freeze of a different kind and relieve the short-term pressure on vulnerable renters in Northern Ireland and beyond, this winter. Local Housing Allowance (LHA) is set at Westminster and governs the amount of Universal Credit housing costs or Housing Benefit private renters are entitled to.
In 2020, Local Housing Allowance was frozen at a level that covered the cheapest 30% of rents. Since then, rent prices have continued to rise while LHA has stayed the same, meaning the rate covers far less than the original 30% of properties it was aligned to. For tenants in Northern Ireland, this means that they have been paying an extra £1,800 a year on rent, with no rise in support. The consequences are stark.
In March 2023, 59,340 households were in receipt of LHA through their housing support. 82% (48,890) had a shortfall between their benefit and their rent. The average shortfall was £103 per month.
Similar shocking statistics are mirrored in Scotland, England and Wales. As we head into the mouth of winter, with a housing crisis upon us, the UK Government has the power to unfreeze LHA and help thousands of vulnerable renters weather this winter.
A question of political will
Housing Rights has been calling and lobbying for LHA to be unfrozen and realigned to the 30th percentile as a minimum for years. We have raised our concerns with the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland. We have, alongside the Cliff Edge Coalition, spelled out the impact the change would have on Northern Ireland renters to Cabinet Ministers.
We have been lobbying local MPs who have asked Parliamentary Questions and lobbied the government for change. We have expressed our fears to the media. Fellow housing organisations in England, Scotland and Wales echo our calls.
The power to address this emergency lies with the UK Government. The evidence that it is needed is overwhelming. Only the will remains. Ahead of the Autumn Statement this week, the political choice lies before them. To do nothing is untenable.
Housing Rights urges the UK Government to stop freezing thousands of people out of sustainable homes this winter, by urgently unfreezing LHA and realigning it back to minimum the 30th percentile of affordability.
