Citizens’ assemblies have been gaining popularity globally, Belgium has launched a permanent citizens’ assembly, France is following suit, and in the UK over 30 assembly initiatives on topics ranging from climate change to Covid-19 have been held over the past five years. In an effort to test both the viability and appetite for assembly structures in Northern Ireland, a wide range of civil society organisations, academics, and community activists launched the Civic Initiative.

Born out of the absence of the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement’s Civic Forum, which was intended to be a consultative space for civil society to engage on socioeconomic and cultural rights and lasted only 2 years (2000-2002), the Civic Initiative actioned a four-stage participatory democracy project.

Stage one sought the input of grassroots communities and wider civil society to identify the key issues, and importantly, their suggested solutions. Over 500 people took part in a 3 hour facilitated workshop; 61% of participants had not taken part in a similar workshop before. It was through this process that communities identified housing, healthcare, and education as the dominant issues in need of urgent change.

Following the prioritisation and identification of issues at stage one further evidence was sought from experts and organisations at the second stage, in addition to a cross border survey on health, housing and education. Key trends were obvious across all three: access, affordability, quality.

Stage three of the Initiative was a Citizens’ Forum on Housing. A Citizens’ assembly can succeed or fail on the question; to be effective there needs to be a clear, answerable ask on a defined topic. The question put to Forum members was: How can we ensure accessible, affordable, quality housing, is available for all?

84 citizens were recruited by UK-based NGO Sortition Foundation using a postal lottery system. 25,000 letters of invitation were mailed to households across Northern Ireland inviting members of the public to register their interest. Participants were selected to be generally representative of Northern Ireland by gender, age, geographical location, ethnicity, religion and educational attainment.  A third of the members had a long term health or disability limitation, and a third were non-voters.

Meeting over the course of three days, Forum members heard evidence and testimony from 18 expert speakers. Members drafted over 60 policy recommendations and passed 38 by a consensus vote of 80 per cent.  Their recommendations spanned accessibility, affordability and sustainability, but also included education, transport, community relations and political institutions. None of the citizens taking part had participated in a similar forum or assembly structure before.

The Citizens’ Forum on Housing agreed a shared vision that recognised the need for a holistic, cross-departmental approach to tackling the housing crisis:

To create a holistic people-centered housing system that provides accessible, affordable, safe, and energy-efficient homes to meet the needs of all individuals and households in a way that fosters greater community cohesion, and a shared sustainable future for all.

Their recommendations included: Legislate to allow the Northern Ireland Housing Executive to borrow and access private finance to build more homes (92% in support); Take forward an integrated approach for all new developments, to include housing, transport, green spaces and access to other public services including schools and healthcare (91%); Demolish properties deemed unfit for human habitation that cannot be redeveloped or refurbished within 18 months (85%); Remove VAT charges for renovations, upgrades and retrofitting old properties (80%); Provide an accessible homelessness intervention hub that offers support to people who are at risk of homelessness but have not met all criteria yet (80%).

The recommendation with the highest level of consensus was not directly related to housing but rather to reform Northern Ireland’s power-sharing institutions so that no one party can collapse the government (94%).  The forum also made recommendations on community cohesion such as an 80% vote for legislation to enforce the removal of all flags and emblems from shared infrastructure, housing and public spaces.  There was equally high support for cross-border measures such as introducing housing as a recurring agenda item at the North South Ministerial council (82%), set up a North-South independent research group to examine potential for cooperation to improve infrastructure and sustainability (80%), and seek cross-border investment from the Irish government to improve water infrastructure in Northern Ireland (85%).

What these recommendations demonstrate is the enormous capacity that citizens have to engage on complex policy issues.  The breadth of recommendations and intersectional approach adopted within such a limited timeframe suggests that there is significant untapped potential for greater participation within Northern Ireland.  Participant evaluations indicate that involvement led to a growth in political interest. 54% of participants stated that they felt more inclined to engage in politics following their participation, while general interest in politics increased from an average of 6.4 to an average of 7.2.  This is of particular note given that a third of the participants were non-voters, suggesting that citizen assembly structures could help reach disenfranchised communities.

As part of the fourth stage of the process the Civic Initiative commissioned Lucidtalk to undertake public opinion polling.  A representative NI sample of 1,051 full responses resulted in 69% support for the use of citizen assemblies by the Northern Ireland Assembly.  When asked which topic they would like to see discussed in a citizens’ assembly respondents stated: Health (70%), Education (59%), and Poverty (52%).  This reinforced the view that there is an appetite and desire for the use of assembly structures within Northern Ireland.

Having experienced a citizens’ assembly firsthand, 91% of the Citizens’ Forum on Housing endorsed the use of citizens’ assemblies by the Northern Ireland Assembly.  Northern Ireland’s political parties already committed to the use of citizen assemblies in New Decade, New Approach, the 2020 deal brokered by the UK and Irish governments to restore Stormont, a commitment that the Assembly has yet to fulfil.  The Citizens’ Forum on Housing provides a blueprint and demonstrates not only that assemblies can be effective but that there is public appetite across communities to be a part of them.

Read the full report here.

Emma DeSouza

Emma DeSouza is a writer, campaigner and peacebuilder.  She served as Chair and Facilitator of the All-island Women's Forum 2021-2022, and works in the area of constitutional law and international human rights.  Emma took forward a high profile court case in relation to the Good Friday Agreement that changed UK immigration law and is a regular contributor to the Irish Times, Irish Examiner and several other publications.