Cllr Tony Hassan at Bradley’s Park during its construction.
The homeless housing crisis in Derry is now worse that it was in the late 1960s, a local councillor has claimed.
Tony Hassan, Sinn Fein’s housing spokesperson, was hitting out after it emerged the development of social homes at Skeoge in the Shantallow area of the city had been halted due to planning irregularities.
Cllr Hassan has now called on the Planning Service to “publicly state” who was responsible for stopping the development.
As a result, he claimed there would be no social housing developments in the Greater Shantallow area for the `”foreseeable future.”
He said: “It has come to my notice that all house building development on the Skeoge lands have been stopped by planning service because of the article 40 being breached and I am calling on the planning service to state who is responsible for this situation.
“Once the development at Bradley’s pass is finished in November there will be no more building of social homes in the Greater Shantallow area for the foreseeable future.
“There are over 2,000 families on the homeless waiting list in the Derry City Council area and if these Developments are stopped the look out is very bad.
“Over the last two years we have had Fold Housing building homes at Glenabbey, Apex Housing at the Marion Hall and at Bradley’s Pass.
“Apex Housing has now a planning application with the planners for 200 social homes at Skeoge and Fold Housing had been working on another housing development at Glenabbey all of this is now stopped.”
Cllr Hassan concluded: “We must do all in our power to end the housing crisis in the city but stopping these developments is sending out the wrong message to the many people who are homeless in this city.”
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