86,239 people are now on the social housing waiting list. Given the sheer scale of human misery and lost opportunity associated with this number you would think public bodies and developers would be bending over backwards to build homes – so what’s the problem?

In an example of what can go wrong, this week the Belfast Telegraph reported on events related to a proposed social housing scheme in Meenan Square in Derry being brought forward by Apex Housing Association, the Northern Ireland Executive Office and the Department for Communities. The story, while complex and more than a little confusing, sets out some pretty murky details of apparent side deals, as well as possible property flipping and anti-competition activity -  all released in error by The Executive Office in response to a Freedom of Information request.

The Meenan Square project, which is intended to provide an as yet unspecified number of homes, a community centre and commercial units in one of the most deprived areas of the city, is due to be funded primarily by the public purse, to the tune of around £12m. However, the project has been on ice for some time and has come in for some criticism, including from local SDLP MLA Mark Durkan, who has said of the development:  “It is lamentable how long the Executive Office has taken to get to this point.”

You’re probably feeling some déjà vu after reading of Belfast City Council’s recent discussions on whether to buy back land compulsorily from Castlebrooke as part of the Tribeca scheme, delayed for several years, leaving the area to rack and ruin.

It seems that the rich, well-connected and the powerful can get support, backing and financial investment for basically anything from public departments, with the added bonus of fixing things for their own long term benefit.

What appears to have happened is that the previous private landowner, Westco, successfully sold the land to Apex Housing Association for over a million pounds, despite buying it for just £320k. In the process a side deal was also done for Westco to keep hold of 10% of the existing land for a bar and off licence, with the agreement that no one else could sell booze anywhere on the land. So you could be forgiven for interpreting this as 90% of the land being sold for three times the price with the public money picking up the tab and enabling a nice little side earner for the future.

It seems that the rich, well-connected and the powerful can get support, backing and financial investment for basically anything from public departments, with the added bonus of fixing things for their own long term benefit. This latest scandal, which no one would know about if an official had not accidentally released all the information, isn’t exactly a surprise to us at PPR. It does make you wonder though - what do homeless families, to whom the state owes duties in law, have to do to get a little help and attention from government departments?

Let’s say a coalition of homeless families and those in housing stress, working together with local and international NGO’s, academics, planners and environmental groups, commissioned an architect to make a sustainable and inclusive master-plan to deliver hundreds of social homes and thousands of square metres of employment space on the biggest area of publicly owned land in the area of greatest housing need in Belfast. What would they have to do to get a bit of that Tribeca and WestCo love from politicians and public servants? Maybe by promising them a cut of future alcohol sales?

We jest of course. But if you’re as serious as we are about doing things differently, support the Take Back The City plan here.