DUP councillor raises housing concerns amid Home Office re-housing of asylum seekers

Concerns of rents due to spike almost 100% in the New Year were highlighted in council chambers amid private sector stock being bought up by the ‘housing solutions company’ across “Lisburn and Belfast”.

The issues were raised to NI Housing Executive (NIHE) CEO Grainia Long at a special meeting, with the housing authority chief saying she had been “very concerned” at the recent portfolio growth of Mears in Northern Ireland.

Alderman Paul Porter said: “In regards to the impact, if any, of the company ‘Mears’, a housing provider who deal with temporary accommodation for refugees. They are also buying and renting properties within the Lisburn and Castlereagh area.

“Have you (NIHE) noticed an impact in regards to the price of rentals as a result of Mears coming in?”

According to Mears’ website, the ‘housing solutions company’ works with the Home Office to provide housing and support to asylum seekers who enter the UK. Mr Porter added: “Remember there is a limited stock of housing, which means they become more valuable and the price of rents go up.

“I have a lady who came to our office, and she is currently paying somewhere in the region of £800 per month and in January/ February she says her rent is going up to £1,400, which is just through the roof."

CEO of the NIHE, Grainia Long responded: “This is a very, very important question. “I suppose if I said generally speaking because the growth and proliferation of growth into the market by Mears has been relatively recent, I think it is probably too early for me to give you a definitive answer.

“Pre-Covid, we as a Housing Executive we were placing about 3,000 households into temporary accommodation a year in Northern Ireland.

“As of now, we are placing about 11,000 households into temporary accommodation, so that is a massive growth in temporary accommodation usage. “It would be clearly speculative of me, but what I can tell you for sure is that we saw a growth in the number of households made homeless because landlords left the sector, that was the first group of people who came to us. “The second group of people, which is a much smaller group of people, are those who came to Northern Ireland had sought and received leave to remain and we have seen a small growth in that demand.

“It is the case that the growth in Mears portfolio has had an impact on the housing market here. It must have done, you can’t suddenly grow a portfolio of that size.

“Now, we were very concerned about that two years ago, we sought meetings with Mears, we now have regular meetings with Mears and rightly so.

“The tone of those meetings are productive, but I am always very clear to Mears that their duty and the Home Office duty to ensure that they give us sufficient notice periods of 28 days, when households have received leave to remain to enable us to plan. “There are times when that works well and times when it works less well. I think that is where we have to work hard and well together.”