Thirty-three people in the Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon Borough have been left without funding for home heating on the approach to the cold winter months.
The Affordable Warmth Scheme is delivered solely by the Housing Executive and is available throughout Northern Ireland to help provide homeowners and private renters “most likely to be in severe to extreme fuel poverty”.
It provides grants of up to £7,500 (£10,000 for solid wall measures) to improve the thermal efficiency of their homes through a range of insulation and heating measures.
However, after a constituent contacted SDLP Councillor Thomas O’Hanlon to say they had been informed that they would not be receiving support – despite being previously informed of their eligibility – it has now been revealed that 33 constituents will be left unsupported due to a lack of funds.
Speaking at a recent Council Meeting, Councillor O’Hanlon raised the issue with Housing Executive officials following a presentation on the Housing Investment Plan.
Explaining that the issue had only been brought to his attention that day, he said: “A constituent had been in contact and they had gone through all the processes and had been told they were eligible – and that was pre-summer – and when they made enquiries with the Executive office today they were advised that a letter of offer could not be issued because they were waiting on funds.
“Is that correct? Are we at the point where there are no affordable warmth offers being issued in the borough because of a lack of money?”
Speaking on behalf of Housing Executive, Energy Efficiency Schemes Manager, Roisin O’Neill replied: “Councillor, you are correct in what you say, unfortunately.
“The Housing Executive made a bid for £14m and we were only successful in securing a budget of £7.5m which means, come the end of September, unless there is further funding from monitoring rounds, we will not be in a position to issue any more approvals.
“We have another 212 to release in September, of which, they are prioritised for those with non-operational heating systems. Other than that… other applications will have to wait until further funding becomes available.”
Further to the response, Councillor O’Hanlon asked if it would be possible to get detail on the number of applications that have been made this year followed by those that haven’t been paid out, or those who are sitting on the waiting list as of this time.
Added the Councillor: “You mentioned a figure of 212…are those 212 people in the borough who have been advised they are eligible and yet there is no money to cover the grant?
“Because if they are eligible – it’s not easy to get on to the ladder for the affordable warmth scheme – to me those are people who are sitting in houses who are cold coming into the winter months.”
Ms O’Neill explained that the 212 are cases were all ready to release where the Executive did have the funding to cover.
In continuation, she said: “Unfortunately, there would be approximately another 500 cases that – if we had have got the funding – we could have released… hence the bid for £14m.
“At the time, we would have been certain that we could have met the funding requirement of £14m but unfortunately because of the constraints and the budget allocation we are not in a position to process those approvals.
“Those waiting in the borough, I can confirm we have 33 waiting on a grant approval and one of those constituents being the one you would have mentioned there.
“So 33, with a value of £172,000, had we the money we could have release those today.”
When issuing the Housing Investment Plan presentation, a slide explaining the projected spend for 2025/26 outlined Affordable Warmth as the least overall spend for the borough at a projected £920,000.
The next highest was Grounds Maintenance at £1.02m followed by Private Sector Grants at £1.72m.
The largest sections of projected spend were outlined as Planned Maintenance, including Stock Improvements at £15.86m and Response Maintenance at £10.74m.
