PART 4: FORMAL AND INFORMAL SUPPORTS
Availability of Housing for Families with Children
Access to suitable accommodation for every child is a key goal of Government. 62
Measure
The percentage of children living in households with a household income below the national 60% median, equivalised using the national equivalence scale, and experiencing basic deprivation.
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Key findings
- 22,335 households with children were identified as being in need of social housing in the 2005 assessment of housing needs (see Table 93). This represents a 24.2% (7,149) decrease compared with the 2002 assessment, when 29,484 households with children were identified as being in need of social housing.
- In 2005, 61.4% of households with children in need of social housing were households with one child; 24.1% were households with 2 children; 8.9% were households with 3 children; and 5.7% of households included 4 or more children. This distribution has remained broadly similar over the period 1996-2005.
Table 93: Number of households with children in need of social housing (1996-2005)
| No. of children | 1996 | 1999 | 2002 | 2005 No. |
2005 % |
| 1 | 10,816 | 14,734 | 17,523 | 13,703 | 61.4 |
| 2 | 4,112 | 6,117 | 7,250 | 5,385 | 24.1 |
| 3 | 1,559 | 2,402 | 2,685 | 1,991 | 8.9 |
| 4 | 690 | 1,036 | 1,126 | 772 | 3.5 |
| 5 or more | 596 | 896 | 900 | 484 | 2.2 |
| Total | 17,773 | 25,185 | 29,484 | 22,335 | 100.0 |
Source: Triennial Assessment of Housing Needs, Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government
- In 2002, 61.0% of households with children in need of social housing had an income of €10,000 or less (see Figure 35). 2.7% of these households had an income in excess of €25,000.
Figure 35: Households with children in need of social housing, by income band (2002)
Source: EU-SILC; CSO
Technical notes
The data for this indicator represent net need for social housing, meaning households who have been assessed as being in need of either local authority or voluntary housing. The terminology used to describe a local authority's housing needs varies. These figures are net of duplicate applications (i.e. applicants who have applied to more than one local authority). A local authority's waiting list may contain duplicate applications.
The guidelines for the Triennial Assessment of Housing Needs, conducted by the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, state that as far as possible particulars of the incomes of applicants should be verified by appropriate up-to-date evidence (e.g. a P60 or via PPSN).
One of the weaknesses of local authority assessments of housing needs (LAAHNs) is that they do not measure severity of housing need and all households on housing waiting lists are treated as though they have an equal level of housing need. This means that there may be some people registered on housing waiting lists who have a very low housing need. On the other hand, LAAHNs may underestimate other elements of housing need.
For example, local authorities are asked to exclude from the final figure certain households that are not assessed as suitable for local authority housing, namely:
- Households whose need for assistance could, in the opinion of the Authority, be more appropriately met by rent or mortgage supplementation under the Supplementary Welfare Allowance Scheme. Arguably, this highly unsatisfactory category was originally a euphemism for single people, who were not seen as appropriate for housing by local authorities.
- Households living in unfit local authority housing.
- Households living in overcrowded or materially unsuitable local authority housing.
- Households whose need could be more appropriately met by other social housing measures (this includes households with a particular need in addition to their housing need).
