Three out of five main Northern Ireland parties opt to say nothing when asked about breaking down the segregation of housing on sectarian lines

Ever since 2008, the number of cross-community housing developments has been quietly growing year on year.

In all, the Department for Communities has told the News Letter that the government intends to construct 1,900 social homes of all kinds every year – of which 200 (roughly 11%) will be in shared schemes, where the government monitors the religious / national / ethnic makeup of the community in an effort to ensure a balance.

For the full story click here – Catholic / Protestant quota-style system now in force in 28 new housing developments – with 31 more to come

The department has told the News Letter it “does not anticipate increasing this target”, although there is appetite among some parties for doing so.

Alliance MLA Kellie Armstrong told the News Letter: “Unfortunately, shared housing developments where people live together and are not separated by religion, age, cultural views or other matters continue to be restricted to a few planned developments instead of being the norm for all new housing.

“The next Programme for Government needs to take forward specific actions to ensure more housing areas are shared and inclusive for all.”

Noting that there have been attempts at intimidation at some shared housing developments (see the sidebar), she added: “Alliance condemns all sectarian attacks or attempts to raise tensions by other methods at these locations and everywhere else.”

Meanwhile UUP MLA Andy Allen said: “The Ulster Unionist Party wants to build a shared future and supports the principle that people should be able to choose to live where ever they want.

“The past 20 or 30 years has seen an increase in people working and socialising together and the next logical step is to see a reduction in segregated housing.

“Where people wish to live in mixed communities as part of shared neighbourhoods they should be facilitated in doing so.

“This is the 21st century and it is high time barriers are broken down as far as possible so that we can build a cohesive community as we move forward.”

The DUP, Sinn Fein, and the SDLP were repeatedly asked to comment too.

The latter two said nothing, whilst the DUP indicated it would issue a statement, and then didn’t.

However back in 2018, when the News Letter last took a serious look into housing segregation, former DUP housing minister Nelson McCausland told the paper: “We’re dealing here with social housing.

“The fact is that private housing is very often as much single-identity as social housing.

“For many people therefore it is clearly a matter of choice that they prefer to live in a single identity community.

“There are people who will want this, there are others who may not, and we have to allow for that.”

However, developing these shared housing schemes “gives people an option”.

Click here – Condemnation of INLA funeral assembly in dedicated mixed housing estate

Click here – RUC ‘collusive’ findings: WATCH as DUP man denounces IRA while speaker Alex Maskey tries to rein him in for ‘going off-topic’

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