Why collaboration is the secret sauce for Northern Ireland’s mixed-tenure housing future

There is an old saying in policy circles that “vision without execution is just hallucination”. In the world of Northern Ireland housing, we have no shortage of vision. Councils’ new local development plans (LDPs) are increasingly ambitious, aiming to create vibrant, mixed-tenure communities. But as any practitioner will tell you, there is often a gap between a policy written on a page and a shovel hitting the ground.

CIH Northern Ireland and Co-Ownership Housing decided this year it was time to help bridge that gap. We hosted a high-level, cross-sector workshop designed to diagnose exactly why the mixed-tenure housing pipeline feels blocked and, more importantly, how we can help to clear it.

The power of serendipity and shared design

The origin of this event was an example of how the best ideas often converge. Our board had suggested more direct ministerial engagement was needed to help address delivery challenges. Following some very productive discussions with the minister’s special advisor and Department for Communities (DfC) officials, we decided to dive deep into the theme of mixed-tenure developments within the context of the new LDPs.

As it turned out, serendipity was on our side. Co-Ownership was exploring almost identical ideas with the department. In the world of public affairs, you learn that the most effective tool for change is getting the right people in the room with a shared mission.

I must give a shout-out to dedicated colleagues at Co-Ownership – including director of customer services Glynis Hobson and director of product development Charlie O’Neill – who co-designed this event with me. Their insight into intermediate housing was the secret sauce that helped us curate a methodology that challenged delegates to think differently.

We knew that to get an honest, unvarnished look at the system, we needed a facilitator who was literate in the subject but sufficiently removed from the day-to-day interests of the stakeholders.

I suggested Andrew Webb, chief economist at Grant Thornton. Having worked with Andrew during my time chairing Belfast City Centre Management Company, I knew his work and experience. He also recently co-authored a report on our wastewater infrastructure crisis and has extensive knowledge of cost rental models. He was the perfect choice to keep the conversation going and ensure we were focussed on measurable, achievable outputs.

Getting under the skin of the problem

We brought together around 30 key stakeholders – local council planners, private developers and housing association leaders. To make sure we weren't just reviewing the problem, we used a structured three-stage methodology:

1. Issue identification – delegates aired their primary challenges and clustered them into sub-themes, like procedural bottlenecks and financial viability
2. The ‘root cause tree’ – we moved past the symptoms (the ‘branches’) to find the underlying causes (the ‘roots’) that we have the power to influence
3. Impact vs. effort matrix – we mapped potential interventions to see what we could fix now and what required long-term strategic investment. 

Four themes to rule the roadmap

The feedback was distilled into four core challenges that act as the primary blockers in our current system:

• Capacity and skills. There is a clear ‘educational gap’ within statutory bodies and at a political level regarding intermediate housing products; we need to upskill the sector so everyone understands the big picture of how these tenures work
• Viability and purpose. We must be honest about the clash of cultures between social missions and commercial realities; rising costs and fixed percentages are creating viability gaps that can stall sites before they even start
• Section 76 standardisation. The current postcode lottery of planning agreements is causing negotiation gridlock and high transaction costs; we need a Northern Ireland-wide model template or approaches to create predictability
• Determining intermediate need. We are often relying on high-level district data; without site-specific, real-time market intelligence, we risk building the wrong type of property for the local community.

The path forward

The workshop wasn't just a diagnostic exercise; it produced a strategic roadmap for our continued engagement with DfC and local government. We identified quick wins – like creating a sector-wide glossary of terms and formalising early engagement at the Pre-Application Discussion (PAD) stage – that can happen in the short term. There are also major projects where further transformation lies.

To keep the momentum, we are moving straight into three thematic roundtable discussions arising from the workshop's findings. These will focus on things like a standardised Section 76 agreement and a central ‘front door’ for housing information to ensure a consistent approach across all eleven councils.

By working together – developers, planners and providers – we can ensure that the vision of our LDPs becomes the reality of new, vibrant homes for our people.