The Government will approve next week a decree-law with urgent measures to face the housing access crisis. It will do so in the last Council of Ministers of the month and it will do so whether or not there is an agreement to push it forward in Congress.
For now, Sumar announced this Wednesday a pact within the coalition to incorporate several of the announced measures, including a two-year extension of rental contracts, until July 2028.
Alongside it, the increase to 21% of the VAT applied to tourist apartments or the regulation of seasonal and room rentals is expected so that they enter into the price interventions that are approved in areas declared as tense.
It is still to be clarified what kind of tax incentives it will contain – the PSOE defends exempting the income of landlords who do not raise rents and Junts wants deductions on mortgage and rental payments--, or if there will be protection measures against evictions.
Also, what measures will be contemplated to streamline urban operations, measures that the PSOE wants to include with the support of the PNV, and that have already failed twice this legislature in two reforms of the Land Law.
The continuity of the package, in any case, will be subject to overcoming the validation vote in September. The Constitution and the Congress Regulations provide a period of thirty days to validate the norm from its promulgation. However, this period is usually applied from the qualification of the norm, so on several occasions the vote takes place more than a month after its publication in the Official State Gazette.
The previous extension of contracts was approved on March 20, published in the BOE a day later and repealed by the Plenary of Congress on April 28.
Is it possible to push it forward?
To achieve validation in Congress, the Government bloc must overcome the votes against PP, Vox, and UPN: 171 votes that will try to reject the decree-law. Without the endorsement of Junts, validation is impossible.
The need to count on their votes opened the door to incorporating tax incentives for owners that a few months ago were a red line for formations like Sumar, ERC, or Bildu. “A toad,” as Sumar acknowledged, which accepts to be able to count on the votes of Carles Puigdemont.
The problem for the Government is that Podemos distances itself from that approach and has already publicly warned that it will not support a decree-law that contains tax cuts for landlords.
The ironic thing is that the incentives announced weeks ago by the Government – a reduction in income tax for landlords who do not raise prices — which frighten the leftist partners is not something that Junts is proposing. It is a measure brought to the debate by the PSOE.
What does Junts ask for?
Junts does demand deductions for tenants in the payment of rent or to owners, but for the amounts paid in the mortgage payment, not on the income received from a tenant. Alongside this, the Catalan independence supporters propose tax advantages for those who sell their home to pay for a stay in a social health center or for savings in search of a first home.
The Puigdemont group has long distanced itself from any negotiation and refers to the proposals made in Congress. And, as a red line, they made it clear that they do not intend to support price controls: “If they present the same old thing, they will get the same old vote,” sources from this formation emphasized to DEMÓCRATA weeks ago.
“Assumable” demands for Sumar
The proposals from Junts, Sumar defends, are "assumable." They do not fully share them, but they believe it is possible to reach an agreement around these types of measures and they are worth it to be able to push forward the shock plan.
Therefore, from the minority partner, they have been demanding in recent days "generosity" from the PSOE when incorporating them into the decree-law, including the exemption planned for the VAT franchise for self-employed individuals with lower billing volume, another of the demands expressed by Junts.
Gap in protection against evictions
Where the agreement is most unlikely is in the protection measures against evictions, as Junts has made it clear on several occasions that it will not accept any moratorium, understanding that it encourages illegal occupation of housing.
Podemos has already indicated that it would not support a decree-law that did not contain these types of measures. However, in the Government, they trust that their vote in that case would be abstention, so as not to be responsible for blocking other measures that they do support, such as the extension of contracts or the regulation of seasonal rentals.
Reform of the Land Law?
The PSOE also seeks to include measures aimed at facilitating the processing of urban planning projects through a reform of the Land Law. These measures have been brought to debate in the Chamber on two occasions, without obtaining enough support to overcome the first vote.
And it is that, in addition to the rejection from PP and Vox, they were also not supported by the left-wing partners, as they understood that certain rights of citizens could be violated when being able to appeal against urban planning plans.
The main core of the reform was to prevent a procedural error from overturning an entire urban planning plan, enabling corrections or partial annulments, and not cascading nullities. The PNV, the party with which the PSOE agreed on the reform this legislature, demanded this Wednesday the inclusion of these measures in the decree-law.
They are not the only ones proposing measures of this type. Among their requests, Junts included incentives for construction and rehabilitation, aimed at increasing the housing supply.