Northern Ireland
STREET SOCCER NORTHERN IRELAND
Street Soccer NI is a charity that uses football to bring positive change to people’s lives. They work with disadvantaged groups including the homeless, long term unemployed, refugees, people with addictions, people with mental health issues, ex-prisoners and more.
Street Soccer NI has 10 sessions a week in Northern Ireland (7 projects for men, 2 for women and 1 for people with learning disabilities) with around 120 people a week coming regularly to the project. They support each regular player to develop a support plan and they help them to meet their needs and achieve their goals including housing, education, volunteering and employment.
Their main funding comes from Northern Ireland Housing Executive and Department for Communities.
Country statistics
13 out of 189 in Human Development Index rating
(UNDP 2019) [United Kingdom]
in 2018, 150 people died while waiting for housing (BBC, 2018).
$38, 950 Average annual salary per person (World Bank, 2021)
Northern Ireland is the north-eastern part of the island of Ireland, which is part of the United Kingdom and borders the Republic of Ireland to the south (Statista, 2021). With a population of 1.8 million, Northern Ireland is small, and comparatively young in relation to the rest of the United Kingdom (Britannica, 2020; CNN, 2021).
Northern Ireland has a politically complex history with regard to religious and national identities of its inhabitants. Between the 1960s-1990s these differences erupted into a 30-year conflict between Protestants and Catholics, known as the ‘Troubles’ (Statista, 2021).
In 2018, almost 150 people died while waiting for housing. 63% of homeless people who had their housing applications closed due to death were under 60 years old (BBC, 2018).
On 31 March 2021 there were 43,971 applicants on the social housing waiting list. Of these applicants, 30,288 were in housing stress. In 2020-2021, 9,889 households were accepted as statutorily homeless. The highest number of applicants for social housing were in Belfast, Derry City, and Strabane. Single males (36%) and families (29%) were the biggest presented of homelessness in 2020/2021. Men aged between 26-59 were the highest presenters of homelessness with 4,312 cases. (NI Communities, 2021).
The Northern Ireland Housing Executive created the Ending Homelessness Together strategy from April 2017-March 2022 for addressing homelessness strategies. These include:
Prioritise the prevention of homelessness
Secure sustainable accommodation and appropriate support for homeless households
Further understand and address the complexities of chronic homelessness
Ensure the right mechanisms are in place to oversee and deliver this strategy
Measure and monitor existing and emerging needs to inform the ongoing development of appropriate services (NI Housing Executive, 2021)
STORIES from the region
