PSOE and Frente Amplio have once again backed the extraordinary extensions of rental contracts and the tax advantages included in the latest housing royal decrees, while the PP has focused its alternative on bringing in one million new homes and Vox has placed “remigration” and the reduction in demand linked to immigration among its main axes.
The first deputy vice president and Minister of Economy, Trade and Business, Carlos Cuerpo (PSOE), the Minister of Social Rights, Consumption and the 2030 Agenda, Pablo Bustinduy (Frente Amplio), the PP’s undersecretary for Finance, Juan Bravo, and Vox’s economic spokesperson, José María Figaredo, confronted each other this Friday on La Sexta with their economic proposals ahead of the general elections on 29 November.
Housing has been one of the central issues in the face-to-face discussion, in a context in which access to a home has become one of the biggest concerns for citizens and has been the source of the general strike of 11 November.
Cuerpo has stated that the event on 29 November presents “two options” in housing policy and has warned about the consequences, as he sees it, of overturning the measures promoted by the Executive. He has calculated that 1.9 million households, around five million people, could avail themselves of a two-year extension to their rental contracts.
The head of Economy has denied that these initiatives set owners against tenants and has stressed that small landlords are also favored. In his view, a landlord who lowers the rent may see his disposable income increased thanks to the planned tax treatment. “Both benefit from renting well,” he said.
Bustinduy has linked the approval of the latest housing decree to the pressure of social mobilizations and has thanked people for participating in the general strike, as well as the role of young people in protests for the right to decent housing.
“Us defending tenants, the working class, and the Partido Popular and Vox voting in favor of large property owners and vulture funds,” he reproached.
The leader of Frente Amplio has recalled that his training has put on the table a tax on the accumulation of homes that would tax, as of the fourth rental home, with 10% of the total value of the property. He has defended that this tax figure would affect 1% of property owners and would make it possible to move 1.3 million homes into affordable housing.
The Minister of Social Rights has likewise argued for promoting a stock of publicly owned housing permanently protected and has questioned whether young people can compete, with current market prices, against investment funds that buy properties without needing to take out a mortgage.
The PP proposes "to build, facilitate and protect"
In his speech, Bravo blamed the current situation of the housing market on the Government’s "poor management" and summarized the PP’s proposal in three pillars: "Build, facilitate and protect." Relying on data that he attributed to the Banco de España, he placed the shortfall at 750,000 homes and warned that it could reach one million in 2028 if the construction pace is not accelerated.
The Popular Party leader reiterated his party’s commitment to promote one million homes in the first legislature and has argued for reforming land legislation, approving a specific law against squatting, and applying tax breaks to favor access to housing.
Among these measures, he cited a 60% reduction in VAT, cuts to the transfer tax, and a "Hucha Hogar Joven" with annual contributions of up to 2,000 euros accompanied by tax deductions.
As for renting, he has defended the possibility of voluntarily extending contracts for three years, through incentives for both the landlord and the tenant. Bravo has countered this approach with "interventionism" and has challenged Cuerpo on an article from 2014 in which, he said, he warned that the costs of rental controls exceeded their benefits.
Vox puts immigration at the center of the debate
For his part, Figaredo has attributed the housing access crisis to the combination of insufficient supply and an increase in demand that he has directly linked to the Government’s immigration policy. "In Spain there are increasingly more people and fewer houses," he has defended.
The economic spokesperson for Vox has included “remigration” among its priorities, which he has specified as the return to their countries of origin of foreign people who commit crimes, as well as the ban on renting to immigrants who are in an irregular situation. He has also called for less regulation, greater legal certainty, measures against squatting, and the abolition of taxes for the first home.