HEALTH boards are to have the power to refuse to pay rent allowances to drug-pushers evicted from local authority housing.
The powers are included in a new Bill to enable local authorities to evict individual drug-pushers.
The Bill, when passed, will allow a local authority to exclude an individual drug-pusher from its housing, without having to evict the entire household. The exclusion order will be granted by the courts.
At present people evicted by local authorities can apply for assistance from the health board, under the Supplementary Welfare Allowance scheme, towards the cost of renting privately.
Now health boards will be able to refuse such assistance if the person was evicted for anti-social behaviour, defined in the Bill as drug-pushing and related serious activities such as intimidation.
Bodies in the housing area will be able to exchange information on people evicted for drug-related activities.
Other provisions in the Housing (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill, 1996 include:
. speeding up legal procedures such as issuing a summons in cases of anti-social behaviour.
. allowing local authorities to refuse to sell houses to tenants on grounds of anti-social behaviour or in the interests of good estate management.
. local authorities will be allowed to deduct rent from social welfare payments so as to prevent arrears building up to the point where they lead to eviction.
. prohibition of intimidation of local housing authority and health board staff or witnesses.
The Minister for the Environment, Mr Howlin, said that "the Bill sends a strong signal that government and statutory agencies will no longer tolerate publicly-funded housing being a base for drug-pushing and related activity. It is not, of course, the full response, which also critically involves rehabilitation of addicts who are drug-pushers and the application of criminal sanctions where appropriate."
Next year £3 million will be spent changing physical features of estates which make it easier for drug-pushers to operate.