Congress rejects the Government's housing decrees and protests intensify

Congress has rejected the decrees with measures on housing that the Government approved last Tuesday. The first norm has fallen with 172 yeses and 178 noes and the second, with 166 in favor and 184 against. The surprise intervention of the President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, who has asked the deputies to “think about the people”, warning them that “history will judge them”, has been of no use, nor have the appeals of the Minister of Housing, Isabel Rodríguez, reminding Puigdemont's party that 90% of its proposals appeared in the decrees, which are no longer in force. As soon as they were rejected, the leader of the PP, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, has accused Sánchez of using the housing issue for his electoral calculations and has demanded that he dissolve the Cortes and move forward the elections.

The Official State Gazette (BOE) has already reported the repeal of the two housing decrees, after the decisive votes of Junts this Friday tipped the balance in favor of the no in Congress.

The most representative unions in the country, UGT and CC OO, meet this afternoon with the Tenants' Union, the organization that started the camp in Sol that has led to demonstrations throughout Spain for the eviction of Maricarmen and that proposes a general strike due to the housing access crisis. The centers will listen to the activists, but it is not foreseeable that they will announce any major decisions this Friday. Union sources indicate that CC OO and UGT are working with the idea of ​​​​posing partial strikes to protest the rejection of PP, Vox and Junts to the decrees on housing, although the decision has not yet been made and will not be confirmed until the union leaders meet.

The Tenants' Union has once again spoken out about the fall of the two housing decrees. “Today is a day of profound hope, today is a day that has nothing to do with defeat, but with the realization that a new political cycle is opening that comes from below, from unionism,” said Alicia del Río, one of the spokespersons, next to the Congress of Deputies, where half an hour ago hundreds of people were demonstrating.

The union defends that the next step in the fight for housing is the general strike, something they have been repeating throughout the entire week, to continue "marking the path of the political cycle that is opening right now. "It is the time for people's politics, for brave politics from the streets and for achieving it. Now begins the real housing legislature that has failed in this Congress,” claimed Del Río.

The Madrid Tenants Union has reacted to the repeal of the two housing decrees. Valeria Racu, one of its spokespersons, blames the right in the press for being “directly responsible and guilty for us having reached this moment.” But he has also blamed the Sánchez Government and its partners, describing the left as “totally incapable of advancing rights, protecting the population and solving the biggest problem in this country.”

The leader of the popular parties, Alberto Núñez Feijóo, has described this Friday's day as “one of the most shameful of this legislature.” According to Feijóo, the parliamentary rejection of the decrees only guarantees that “the housing situation is not worse today than yesterday” although he added that “that does not mean that it will be better tomorrow.” In addition, he has encouraged Sánchez to call elections.

The Minister of Social Rights, Pablo Bustinduy, has addressed the citizens mobilized in the streets these days after the repeal of the two decrees on housing. “No resignation, no one lowers their arms. The union has called for mobilizations throughout the country, and the right to housing is going to make way,” he declared in the Congress courtyard.