{"id":23550,"date":"2023-10-26T14:20:59","date_gmt":"2023-10-26T14:20:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/factcheckni.org\/?p=23550"},"modified":"2023-12-18T11:10:15","modified_gmt":"2023-12-18T11:10:15","slug":"have-social-housing-waiting-lists-almost-doubled-in-20-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/factcheckni.org\/articles\/have-social-housing-waiting-lists-almost-doubled-in-20-years\/","title":{"rendered":"Have social housing waiting lists almost doubled in 20 years?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
On 7 October, an article in the Belfast Telegraph claimed:<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cTwo decades ago, 26,248 people were waiting for social housing. Now more than 45,000 are waiting.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n According to official statistics, this is accurate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Moreover, these two points of data, 20 years, are not outliers. Nor do they create any misleading impression.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Both fit within a broad trend. Although waiting lists have not gone up every single year, in general they have been getting longer over the past two decades.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The latest social housing figures from the Department of Communities (DfC) and the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency (NISRA) were published in August<\/a>, and covered the second quarter of 2023 (April to June, inclusive).<\/p>\n\n\n\n According to those figures<\/a>, a total of 45,292 applicants are on the social housing waiting list. Data for the previous quarter also showed over 45,000 applicants on the list.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n What about 20 years ago?<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Northern Ireland Housing Statistics are an annual publication, also published by DfC and NISRA. The most recent report outlined, published last December<\/a>, covered the year 2021-22.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That report is accompanied by official figures that cover the past two decades which show that, in 2002-03, there were 26,248 applicants on the waiting list.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This demonstrates thatthe claim is accurate, but it\u2019s worth checking to see if there is anything unusual about these figures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In short, the figures from the claim do not appear to be outliers. Instead, it looks like they fit within an overall trend of rising demand over 20 years:<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n\n
\n
\n