Sumar is stepping up pressure on his government partner to take measures to lower rents. He did so in September with a set of proposals for the negotiation of budgets and continued in the following weeks with repeated criticism of the Minister of Housing, Isabel Rodríguez, for statements in which she demanded ” solidarity” of the owners. Next week he will facilitate his appearance in Congress, just a few days after the demonstration that will tour several cities in Spain on this issue and in which the leaders of Yolanda Díaz’s party will participate.
The second vice-president has been warning for some time that all government measures to improve the social protection of citizens, such as increasing the minimum wage or social protections, have no effect in the face of an increase like that experienced by rents in recent years. years. But since the return from the summer holidays, Sumar has placed the question of housing as one of the main axes of this issue, which is becoming the main concern of the Spaniards, according to surveys.
Rents have skyrocketed across the country. The phenomenon goes beyond large cities like Madrid and Barcelona. According to data analyzed by elDiario.es, between 2015 and 2022, rents increased by an average of 30% in each of the streets and neighborhoods of Spanish metropolitan areas. On the Mediterranean coast, in cities like the Balearic Islands, Valencia or Malaga, rents are increasing above average, up to 40%. Real estate inflation also affects the buying and selling of apartments.
This situation has pushed tenants’ unions and the housing rights movement to call a demonstration in Madrid and other cities in Spain this Sunday under the slogan Housing is a right, not a business. A mobilization in which leaders of Movimiento Sumar such as Lara Hernández or Elizabeth Duval will participate, even if a priori none of the coalition ministers will be present.
Some leaders will attend the demonstration even though its organizers hold the government responsible for the current situation. “We cannot leave the solution in the hands of those who have spent years without putting an end to a parasitic system that expels us from our homes,” says the manifesto in which they called on citizens to take to the streets. In the coalition, they affirm that they will not carry party signs and that they will present themselves in their personal capacity. “We, the parties, must not stifle popular mobilizations,” maintains a source from Sumar.
“It is not enough to govern or contain the damage,” said Sumar’s parliamentary spokesperson, Íñigo Errejón, to Pedro Sánchez on Wednesday, aware of this perception of a section of citizens against the government’s inaction. During the Director General’s intervention on immigration, the MP took the opportunity to remind him of their differences on housing, which are more important, he said, than those they have with the right on this subject.
In this intervention, Errejón asked the Ministry of Housing to stop “faltering” and find a “path” in favor of the right to housing. In recent weeks, Sumar has reiterated his criticism of Rodríguez. Especially in those who appealed to the “solidarity” of owners to lower the price of rent. “Just as the eight-hour day was not due to the benevolence of the bosses, just as the SMI was not a gift from the bosses, it will not be the solidarity of the owners which will bring down prices but the force tenants. The PSOE must not be mistaken,” the coalition spokesperson responded this Wednesday from the podium.
Some coalition parties went further in their criticism. “Two words: resignation or termination,” said IU leader Amanda Meyer. Commons Congressional Speaker Aina Vidal called the minister’s comments an “insult to intelligence.”
Precisely next week, the Office of Congressional Spokespersons will debate a proposal to summon Rodríguez to a plenary session. The initiative was registered a few weeks ago by ERC, EH Bildu and Podemos. Sumar will not oppose the Council, so it is likely that at the end of November there will be a monographic debate on housing with the minister in Congress.
Sumar measures in housing
Sumar drew up a list of priorities, which she included in the negotiation of public accounts, to complement the housing law approved by Congress in the last legislature, but most of which is delegated to the autonomous communities and councils municipal.
This law, applicable only in Catalonia, promoted by the previous executive led by ERC, allows the declaration of stressed areas in cities where prices have increased extraordinarily in recent years to establish ceilings on rental prices there.
But with the majority of governments in the hands of the PP, this text has practically no effect. This is why Sumar proposed to the PSOE to “condition all public housing aid intended for communities” on the application of this law. This is a measure that a few weeks later Rodríguez herself considered as an option, although she later changed her mind and, in the meeting with the councilors, she proposed, instead of sanctions, rewards to governments that enforce regulations.
In this document, the coalition also included a measure that did not please the PSOE very much: prohibiting the purchase of housing for speculation. Even if the detail is less ambitious: it is a temporary ban on purchases, in tense areas, if this house is intended for uses other than usual housing and affordable rental. “In the current emergency situation that our country is experiencing, the purchase of housing cannot have a speculative purpose,” we can read in the text.
The socialist spokesperson in Congress, Patxi López, just days after learning of the measure, described it as an “extreme proposal.” They also ask to increase the stock of social housing. For example, through the construction during the legislature of “500,000 social rental housing units between 400 and 600 euros in areas of tension where the mobilization of empty housing is insufficient”.
Where there seems to be a rapprochement is in one of the measures that, according to the tenants’ unions, represent a real flaw in the housing law approved by the PSOE and the Unidas Podemos government: the regulation of rentals seasonal. A few weeks ago, PP, Junts and Vox voted against a legislative initiative to limit these types of contracts, which landlords use to avoid price controls under state law. At that time, although without much enthusiasm, the PSOE was in favor of the adoption of this bill.
The groups will have a new opportunity to position themselves on this issue since the ERC announced this Wednesday to Congress that it would re-register this text.
