Number needing social housing ‘may be double’ estimates, at 122,000

The number of households in need of social housing is likely to be double Government estimates, a report from the Parliamentary Budget Office (PBO) has indicated.

The removal of households in receipt of the housing assistance payment (HAP) from housing waiting lists has the potential to “mask” and “distort” the true extent of social housing need, according to the report from the Oireachtas independent financial watchdog.

HAP recipients are tenants of private landlords who are eligible for social housing supports. However, once they accept a HAP rental, they are removed from their local authority housing waiting list as, under legislation, their housing need is deemed to have been met.

In its latest report on housing, the PBO said this practice may be “artificially reducing” waiting lists which were “the primary measurement of future housing needs”.

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Approximately 60,000 households are on local authority housing waiting lists, but a similar and growing number are in receipt of HAP payments in the private rented sector, meaning “the more accurate estimate for households with a housing need may be closer to 122,000″, the report stated.

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While HAP tenants can apply to their local authority’s housing transfer list as a potential route into a council home, placing these tenants on the transfer list instead of the main housing list “can mask long-term housing requirements and understate the level” of social housing that needs to be built, the PBO said.

“In many cases, HAP may provide an adequate housing solution, with certain households having short-term need for housing support; however, a significant cohort of HAP tenants may consider that their needs are not adequately met under that scheme and wish to be considered for long-term social housing support,” the report stated.

The PBO had been advised by the Department of Housing “that the majority of HAP tenants choose to be added to local authority transfer lists”, it said. However, the department was “unable to provide the PBO” with an analysis of the HAP component of the transfer lists. “In the absence of detailed analysis of social housing transfer lists”, it said, “the true scale of unmet social housing need in the State is unknown”.

While HAP tenants had the same protections as other private tenants, “by not being direct tenants of a local authority or AHB [approved housing body], they do not have a continuous right to have their housing need met in the result of their tenancy ceasing,” it said.

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“It is this precarity of tenure and the fact that most HAP tenants wish to remain in consideration for long-term local authority/AHB housing that prompts the PBO to suggest the additional ‘ongoing need’ measurement.”

The ongoing need classification would encompass the majority of HAP tenants who want long-term social housing, it said.

Minister for Housing Darragh O’Brien said not all HAP tenants wanted social housing.

“We know that not everybody who is on HAP is waiting for a permanent housing solution so it is not just as easy as adding that in on top of the list.”