The Northern Ireland Housing Trust was a public authority which provided

public housing Public housing is a form of housing tenure in which the property is usually owned by a government authority, either central or local. Although the common goal of public housing is to provide affordable housing, the details, terminology, de ...

Northern Ireland Northern Ireland ( ga, Tuaisceart Éireann ; sco, label=Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots, Norlin Airlann) is a part of the United Kingdom, situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, that is #Descriptions, variously described as ...

from 1945 until 1971, when its functions were merged into the newly created

Northern Ireland Housing Executive The Northern Ireland Housing Executive is the public housing authority for Northern Ireland. It is Northern Ireland's largest social housing landlord, and the enforcing authority for those parts of housing orders that involve houses with multiple ...

. The Northern Ireland Housing Trust was established by the Housing Act (Northern Ireland) 1945.Martin Melaugh
Majority Minority Review 3: Housing and Religion in Northern Ireland, Section 2: Housing Policy and Public Reaction 1945 To 1971
CAIN, Ulster University, 1996-2018 The Housing Committee of the Planning Advisory Board had published a report on housing in Northern Ireland in 1944, which estimated that 100,000 new houses were needed to meet Northern Ireland's housing needs. The Housing Trust was expected to build 25,000 of those, with the remaining 75,000 to be built by local councils.Sir Lucius O'Brien
"The Northern Ireland Housing Trust"
''Journal of the Statistical and Social Inquiry Society of Ireland'' Vol. XXIX, Part I, 1952/1953, pp. 60-72 The Trust built 48,500 dwellings between 1945 and 1971, funded by government loans. Many used non-traditional

prefab Prefabrication is the practice of assembling components of a structure in a factory or other manufacturing site, and transporting complete assemblies or sub-assemblies to the construction site where the structure is to be located. The term is u ...

building techniques, like the concrete Orlit and No-fines and the steel-framed Easi-Form. However, these have since proved difficult to heat and insulate, prone to damp, and expensive to maintain. The Trust also built some high-rise tower blocks, partly because of

green belt A green belt is a policy and land-use zone designation used in land-use planning to retain areas of largely undeveloped, wild, or agricultural land surrounding or neighboring urban areas. Similar concepts are greenways or green wedges, which h ...

policies, but these had many problems, and most have since been demolished. The Trust introduced a points-based system to allocate houses impartially, and was supposed to operate in conjunction with local councils. But because only ratepayers could vote in council elections, some councils, particularly in the west, were keen to control housing allocations in their areas for electoral advantage, and opposed the Trust's efforts, withholding planning permission and sewerage facilities and causing unnecessary delays. One Tyrone councillor explicitly stated, "we will not tolerate the Trust giving houses to Catholics." The number of houses the Trust built in western areas was thus low relative to need. They had difficulty building cheaply enough to keep the rent low, and there was a perception that they favoured better-off tenants. These factors had the effect of disadvantaging Catholic tenants, which was one of the grievances that led to the

Northern Ireland civil rights movement The Northern Ireland civil rights movement dates to the early 1960s, when a number of initiatives emerged in Northern Ireland which challenged the inequality and discrimination against ethnic Irish Catholics that was perpetrated by the Ulster ...

in the late 1960s. Following civil disturbances in 1968-69, a commission appointed by the Northern Ireland government and led by Lord Cameron found that "grievances concerning housing were the first general cause of the disorders which it investigated".First Annual Report, Northern Ireland Housing Executive, 13th May 1971 to 31st March 1972 The Housing Executive Act (Northern Ireland) 1971 created a unitary housing authority for Northern Ireland, the

, which took over the functions of the Trust in 1971, the housing functions of the councils in 1972, and the housing functions of the New Town Development Commissions for

Derry Derry, officially Londonderry (), is the second-largest city in Northern Ireland and the fifth-largest city on the island of Ireland. The name ''Derry'' is an anglicisation of the Old Irish name (modern Irish: ) meaning 'oak grove'. The ...

, Antrim,

Ballymena Ballymena ( ; from ga, an Baile Meánach , meaning 'the middle townland') is a town in County Antrim, Northern Ireland. It is part of the Borough of Mid and East Antrim. The town is built on land given to the Adair family by King Charles I i ...

, and

Craigavon Craigavon may refer to: * Craigavon, County Armagh, a planned town in Northern Ireland ** Craigavon Borough Council, 1972–2015 local government area centred on the planned town * Viscount Craigavon, title in the Peerage of the United Kingdom ** ...

in 1973.

References

{{reflist Public housing in the United Kingdom 1945 establishments in Northern Ireland 1971 disestablishments in Northern Ireland Housing in Northern Ireland