Almost 60 per cent of social housing built or redeveloped in 2018 was constructed in the last quarter of the year, figures from the Department of Housing show.
End-of-year statistics published by the department show a local authority “new build” figure of 2,022 social homes last year. This figure includes “turnkey” projects – new homes purchased from private developers, and regeneration projects that largely replaced older existing social housing, as well as new homes built by local authorities.
Housing charities had a new-build figure of 1,388 last year, while 841 homes were provided under the “Part V” scheme, where developers are required to make 10 per cent of new estates available to local authorities for use as social housing.
Part V scheme
The figures show the vast majority of these homes were provided in the last three months of the year. Up to the end of September, local authorities had provided 833 new-build homes, 582 had come from approved housing bodies and 349 from the Part V scheme.
The number of local authority new-build homes provided doubled last year. In 2017 local authorities built 1,014 homes. Similarly housing bodies had provided 761 houses and apartments. The number of Part V homes also showed an increase, up from 522 in 2017.
In addition, the Department of Housing said, figures show that almost 5,000 new social homes are currently being built across 291 sites and this is being added to on a weekly basis.
