The Housing Assistance Payment (HAP) is a flexible and immediate form of social housing support for people with a long-term housing need. Any household assessed by their local authority as eligible for social housing is immediately eligible for HAP. These households must find their own accommodation in the private rental sector.
The HAP scheme started in 2014. At the end of Quarter 3 2021, 97,600 HAP tenancies had been set up since the scheme commenced, of which there were more than 62,300 households actively in receipt of HAP support and over 33,600 separate landlords and agents providing accommodation to households supported by the scheme.
The table below shows total expenditure by my Department for the HAP scheme for each year from 2015 to the end of 2021:
Year
|
No. of local authorities operating HAP scheme
|
Outturn €m
|
2015
|
18
|
15.6
|
2016
|
28
|
57.7
|
2017
|
31
|
152.7
|
2018
|
31
|
276.6
|
2019
|
31
|
382.4
|
2020
|
31
|
464.7
|
2021
|
31
|
541.7
|