Extension Of Housing Bill To Northern Ireland

EDM number 807 in 1995-96, proposed by Eddie McGrady on 30/04/1996.

That this House regrets that the Department of the Environment (Northern Ireland) still plans to introduce the provisions of the current Housing Bill into Northern Ireland in due course; notes that the present Bill for England and Wales remains substantially unamended and so will still result in severe weakening of the safety net for homeless people and those in most urgent need, including families with childen; notes that 10,068 households presented themselves as homeless to the Northern Ireland Housing Executive in 1994-95 which represents a rise of three and a half per cent. on the previous year and almost two per cent. of the total number of househoolds in Northern Ireland; regrets the Government's plan increasingly to rely on the private rented sector to house homeless households when that sector has been in a dramatic decline in Northern Ireland from 90 per cent. total housing stock in 1914 to barely three and a half per cent. today; regards the present proposals therefore as at best inappropriate and at worst highly detrimental; and calls upon her Majesty's Government both to withdraw the present Bill and to reconsider its extension in any form to Northern Ireland.

This motion has been signed by a total of 16 MPs.