---
title: "No safeguards yet for social housing if hospital workers take Andium homes"
url: https://www.nsfw.info/no-safeguards-hospital-workers-andium-social-housing/
published: 2026-10-13T08:30:57+00:00
modified: 2026-10-13T08:30:57+00:00
author: "Chief Editor"
categories: ["Housing"]
image: https://www.nsfw.info/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/no-safeguards-hospital-workers-andium-social-housing-1024x572.webp
summary: "758 households are on Jersey's social housing waiting list, yet no safeguards exist to protect their priority if Andium homes are offered to hospital constructi"
publisher: NSFW (https://www.nsfw.info)
---

# No safeguards yet for social housing if hospital workers take Andium homes

**In brief:** There are currently no safeguards ensuring local residents take priority if Andium Homes properties are allocated to hospital construction workers, with 758 households already on the social housing waiting list. The Housing Minister says he has not yet evaluated the proposal, and key criteria for protecting local applicants have not been established. The Health Minister insists no local people will be displaced, but the details remain unresolved.

## Workers Incoming, Safeguards Absent

Jersey’s new hospital is coming, and with it a construction workforce of considerable size. The Jersey Evening Post reports that the government’s contract with Bouygues UK for the new hospital makes the government responsible for accommodating the construction workforce. At its peak, that workforce is expected to reach around 800 employees and subcontractors, including local workers. Around 450 are expected to commute regularly to and from the island, with approximately 150 relocating for the duration of the build.

Health Minister Senator Tom Binet has confirmed that accommodation will be sought “just about anywhere we can find”, including social housing managed by Andium Homes, alongside private-sector housing and vacant accommodation already rented by the Health Department. Senator Binet has insisted that Andium properties would only be used where homes are “not required by local people”, and that “the plan is not to displace anybody”. Reassuring words. The problem is that nobody has yet worked out how to put those words into practice.

## 758 Households Waiting, Criteria Still Unwritten

The stakes are not trivial. Figures cited in the Jersey Evening Post show that 758 active households were awaiting social rented accommodation as of 30 September, including 267 in Band 1, the highest priority band, covering those who are homeless, facing imminent eviction, have urgent medical issues, or are living in unsuitable conditions. These are not people who can afford to wait while the relevant ministers get around to having a meeting.

Yet that is precisely where things stand. Responding to a written question from Deputy Lyndsay Feltham, Housing Minister Deputy Malcolm Ferey acknowledged he had “not yet been afforded the opportunity to evaluate” the proposed use of Andium homes for hospital workers, and had not agreed with Senator Binet on how any arrangement would work. He said he would “fully expect” applicants with urgent housing needs to be prioritised, but conceded that the arrangements have not yet been developed. He committed to “appropriate transparency of arrangements”, but said he could not publish details before being briefed and reaching an agreement in principle. In other words: watch this space, but the space is currently empty.

Deputy Feltham pressed further, asking what evidence would establish that a home was not needed locally, whether suitable social housing applicants would first be offered any such property, and what assessment had been made of the impact on housing availability and waiting times. Discussions between the two ministers are planned. No current Andium homes are being held for future hospital construction workers.

## Andium’s Existing Arrangements and Vacant Properties

The Housing Minister’s answers also shed some light on Andium’s existing arrangements with the Health Department. Andium currently rents 214 homes directly to Health for key workers. The government manages the occupancy of those properties, and Andium does not know which are empty at any given time. That is a notable gap in oversight for a public housing body.

Other vacant Andium homes were reported to be undergoing repairs, in the process of being allocated to applicants, or awaiting sale through the assisted-purchase scheme. One property at Le Clos Couriard had been empty for 182 days while undergoing major repairs. On a more positive note, 32 newly completed flats at Palmer Court were due to be occupied by mid-October, and 11 new houses at Clos des Friquettes had mostly been allocated. Senator Binet also confirmed that new purpose-built worker accommodation is not currently envisaged.

## The NSFW Perspective

There is something almost admirably candid about a minister admitting, in writing, to the States Assembly, that he has not yet had the opportunity to evaluate a policy that his colleague has already announced publicly. It is the governmental equivalent of a builder turning up to a job and mentioning, cheerfully, that they haven’t quite looked at the plans yet.

To be fair to Deputy Ferey, he appears to have been put in an awkward position by Senator Binet’s announcement, and at least he is being honest about the gap rather than papering over it with reassuring waffle. But for the 267 households in Band 1 on the waiting list, including people who are homeless or facing eviction right now, the comfort of ministerial candour has its limits. The question of who gets priority in Jersey’s social housing is not a detail to be sorted out at a future meeting. It is the whole point.

Jersey residents will rightly want to know that the island’s social housing stock exists first and foremost for the island’s most vulnerable residents, not as a convenient solution to a workforce logistics problem created by a government contract. The ministers involved would do well to get those discussions concluded, and the criteria published, well before the first hard hat arrives on site.

*Source: [Jersey Evening Post](https://jerseyeveningpost.com/news/2026/10/13/no-current-safeguards-for-islanders-as-hospital-workers-could-be-offered-andium-homes)*