Illa calls for exceptional EU intervention in housing

The barometer from the Centre for Opinion Studies places Salvador Illa's PSC nine seats below its previous result. Meanwhile, the Govern is seeking EU regulation of the housing market.

Housing has become the issue with which the Catalan left is trying to regain electoral ground. According to information from Vozpópuli, the barometer from the Centre for Opinion Studies (CEO), known as the Catalan CIS, shows Salvador Illa's PSC losing nine seats. The survey attributes this setback to the Govern's management issues and its distance from constitutionalist voters.

The same study paints a grim picture for the Comuns, who could end up with four seats after losing two more. The CUP would maintain its four deputies in the CEO, although a survey by El Periódico published this summer gave it between four and none in the Parliament.

Given this scenario, the Govern has decided to take the discussion to Brussels. Illa met this week with the president of the European Council, António Costa, and the vice-president of the European Commission, Teresa Ribera, to request exceptional intervention in housing matters.

“Access to housing”

According to the Catalan Executive, the EU should regulate the real estate market in a “drastic” manner, using the Catalan model as a reference, including limiting rental prices and tourist apartments. Consellera Sílvia Paneque argues that a European framework would prevent the PP from “automatically” blocking in court the measures that the Govern considers “brave”.

In Gerona, the CUP is also taking action. In the full session of the Gerona City Council this Tuesday, the party, Guanyem Girona, and ERC passed a motion demanding more intervention from the Generalitat and the State in the real estate market. The mayor, Lluc Salellas, blames the problem on the “free market” of housing.

The motion calls for indefinite contracts for habitual housing, a ban on speculative buying and selling, a halt to evictions of vulnerable people, and a reduction in rental prices. It also demands that the Generalitat be given the apartments from Sareb and that powers be transferred to the Govern to prevent the Constitutional Court from blocking them. The PSC abstained, despite agreeing with part of the Govern's argument.