The parliamentary groups of PP and Vox in the Assembly of Extremadura have overturned an initiative by Unidas por Extremadura that demanded that the regional government declare, ex officio, the Tensioned Residential Market Zones in those municipalities in Extremadura that meet the legal requirements, in order to use the tools provided to stop the increase in rental prices and contain evictions without alternative housing.
The spokesperson for Unidas por Extremadura, Irene de Miguel, has defended this push proposal in this Thursday’s plenary session, which has only received support from her group and the Socialist Party.
Among its points, the initiative urged the regional Executive to urgently review the modules and maximum prices of the Protected Housing (VPO) to correct the “current distortion” that allows protected housing to end up priced above free-market prices, adjusting the sale limits to levels “truly affordable and in line with” the median income of the population in Extremadura.
It also proposed redirecting regional land and housing policy, prioritizing public investment in the creation of a stock of protected housing for social rent, with the aim of preventing the first sales from turning into an “unaffordable market product.”
De Miguel has insisted that housing should not become a “privilege” or a “luxury for a few,” and she has emphasized that it represents a “societal failure” if young people with jobs cannot emancipate or if workers, including working families, are forced to share an apartment.
In her view, the current housing situation in Spain is the result of political decisions that have turned a “constitutional right into an extraordinarily profitable business for a few” and a “daily nightmare for millions of people.”
Taking positions
In the phase for taking positions, PP deputy Miguel Ángel Nieto has recalled that the declaration of Tensioned Residential Market Zones must be requested by town councils, as the regulations establish.
He said that, according to his data, “no town council in Extremadura has requested it, zero, zero,” and that, across the country, only five communities have taken that step. He also warned that limiting prices can lead owners to take homes off the market, reducing the rental supply.
In his opinion, the Junta of Extremadura is right to bet on measures based on public-private collaboration, such as aid to developers or direct support for entry. “Above all, that more housing be built and not so much intervention,” he emphasized.
On the other hand, the PSOE deputy Juan Ramón Ferreira has described as “quite frustrating” that, when dealing with a key issue such as access to housing in Extremadura, the deputies who support the regional government focus on matters that, in his view, “have nothing to do with the problem of the people of Extremadura.”
He has called on the parliamentarians for respect and to heed the proposals of the opposition, considering that the Junta leaves out “a large part of society” when it designs its housing policies.
According to Ferreira, the regional Executive faces the housing crisis from a “packaged society” perspective that is limited to the family that buys a house to live there their whole lives, without taking other social realities into account.
Finally, Vox deputy Ángel Pelayo Gordillo has asked why the coalition government in Spain has not adopted effective measures to solve the housing problem.
“You need to have boldness and shamelessness to come here and pour more gasoline on the fire,” he said, noting that Unidas por Extremadura brings together political forces with representation in the Council of Ministers.
Along these lines, he has stressed that Unidas has an “astonishing ability to come here, as indignant citizens, as if you hadn’t been participants in the destruction of Spain with Pedro Sánchez, as if you hadn’t held ministries and the vice presidency.”