Environmental, Social and Governance in housing

In housing, ESG sits where policy, governance, and lived experience meet. Strategies and frameworks give it structure, but people measure it in warmer homes, safer communities, secure tenancies, and services that are there when they need them.

For approved housing bodies, ESG has a direct role. Housing delivery is often counted at completion, yet the responsibility continues through decades of management, maintenance, investment, and community engagement. Homes need to perform well. Services need to respond. Member Tenants need clear information, safe neighbourhoods, and confidence that their housing provider will act when issues arise.

Co-operative Housing Ireland’s first Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) Strategy 2026-2030, shows how closely these responsibilities are connected. It gives structure to work already happening across homes, services, communities, and governance, with a stronger focus on evidence, accountability, and long-term outcomes.

The strategy is built around four pillars: environmental responsibility and climate action; providing safe, affordable, and secure homes; empowering people and communities; and upholding integrity, accountability, and good governance.

Retrofitting, energy performance, climate resilience, tenancy security, community building, data quality, and transparency all influence the standard of homes and services people receive.

The strategy also gives more weight to the parts of housing work that shape trust over time. Services that people understand and can rely on, for example: support before financial pressure escalates; action when anti-social behaviour affects a neighbourhood; and homes that are safe, accessible, and well managed.

For Co-operative Housing Ireland, these priorities sit across affordability, tenancy security, statutory safety checks, accessible design, Member Tenant engagement, community building, health, development and learning, digital inclusion, equality and diversity, and colleague wellbeing. They show how ESG can strengthen the everyday relationship between a housing provider, its homes, and the people who live in them.

Co-operative Housing Ireland has strengthened this work through dedicated teams focused on issues that affect Member Tenants most directly.

The neighbourhood team supports tenancy and estate management, helping to address everyday issues across homes and estates.

The income and financial inclusion team supports rent and arrears management while also focusing on wider financial wellbeing.

The safer neighbourhoods team supports Member Tenants experiencing anti-social behaviour or domestic abuse, with an emphasis on early intervention, prevention, and safety.

Together, these teams show how the strategy can move from framework to service delivery. They create clearer routes to support, earlier responses, and more focused help for the issues that affect whether people feel safe, settled, and supported.

This focus on people is also reflected in wider initiatives. Co-operative Housing Ireland’s first dedicated mental health programme, It Takes a Village, recognised the link between housing, community, and wellbeing. Its education bursary programme awarded four bursaries to support Member Tenants in learning and personal development.

That long-term responsibility also applies to the homes themselves. Co-operative Housing Ireland has completed more than 350 deep energy retrofits since 2018 through its Improving Warmth and Wellbeing programme. It aims for all managed homes to reach a minimum BER B2 by 2035 and BER A2 or above by 2050, with an average of 110 retrofits per year.

At Westcourt in Dublin 8, Co-operative Housing Ireland completed a deep energy retrofit of 46 homes through the programme. The works improved the homes from an average BER of D1 to B1. Member Tenants reported better warmth, comfort, and quality of life. One Member Tenant said she no longer needed heavy clothing indoors. Another described her home as lovely and cosy, with constant hot water and reliable warmth.

Member Tenant Maura in her newly retrofitted home.

EnergyCloud offers another example of how practical thinking can improve the everyday experience of a home. Through the partnership, selected Co-operative Housing Ireland homes took part in a pilot using surplus wind energy to provide free hot water.

Participating homes benefited on 114 nights last year, and the programme will expand to more homes in Fingal. Renewable energy that might otherwise go unused can support household comfort and reduce pressure on Member Tenants.

For housing providers, good work also needs to be visible. Investment, services, and governance need to show clearly how they improve homes, support communities, and deliver value over time.

Co-operative Housing Ireland developed its strategy with KSN Horizon through policy review, engagement, and materiality assessment. Nearly 400 survey responses from Member Tenants, staff, board members, and external stakeholders helped shape the framework, bringing together views from the people who live in its homes, work with the organisation, and govern its work.

That process gave Co-operative Housing Ireland clearer insight into the issues that matter most to people closest to its homes and services. It also helped separate the areas where reporting can begin now from those where stronger data, systems, and processes will be built over the next three years.

Across the housing sector, ESG can help connect investment decisions with service quality, environmental performance, tenant wellbeing, and good governance.

ESG builds on a purpose that has guided Co-operative Housing Ireland since 1973, providing homes co-operatively, in partnership with communities and people who need secure, affordable housing. The new strategy gives that purpose a clearer structure for the years ahead.

The value of ESG lies in the change it can bring. For Co-operative Housing Ireland, that means safer homes, stronger communities, clearer services, warmer homes, and decisions that support Member Tenants over time.

For more information:
Contact details:
Co-operative Housing Ireland, 11-12
Warrington Place, Dublin, D02 E221
T: +353 1 661 2877
E: admin@cooperativehousing.ie