Mass protests against the housing shortage in Spain after the failure of the rental reform

Only the torrential rain slowed down the demonstrators in Barcelona over the weekend. Tens of thousands protested in around 50 Spanish cities over the weekend against housing shortages, real estate speculation and for a general strike. In Madrid they moved from the tent camp at Puerta del Sol to Cibeles Square in front of the town hall. According to the central government, there were 70,000 protest participants; the organizers in Madrid spoke of half a million. There were violent clashes with police in the Spanish capital and Valencia, who used tear gas and rubber-coated bullets.

The demonstrators' disappointment and anger have grown again a week after the government's two housing policy decrees failed in parliament on Friday. “The power is back on the streets,” warned Valerie Racu, spokeswoman for the Tenants Union, whose organization is organizing the protests. "We will not tolerate another four years without addressing the problem in our country. This will continue until everything changes," she said. She was alluding to an early election, which Spain is eagerly awaiting after the failure of the rent reform in parliament.

The heated debate in parliament already showed that the election campaign has been underway for a long time. The only thing missing is the election date. After both decrees failed to reach a majority, Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez's entourage said that he was using the weekend for a “period of reflection”. Many people understood his appeal to MPs on Friday as an indication of the direction in which the head of government's thoughts were heading.

Sánchez called on parliamentarians to live up to citizens' expectations and "do the right thing, because history will hold them accountable sooner than they believe - and with greater severity than they can imagine." Instead of a regular election next summer, Sánchez could call a new election on November 29th at the earliest. But he doesn't make the decision alone.

At the weekend, the head of government counted his battalions in Madrid and spoke to confidants and pollsters. According to surveys, he and his coalition partner Sumar have so far no chance against the conservative PP and the right-wing populist Vox party. The right-wing opposition could win up to 200 of the 350 seats. But it was PP, Vox and the separatist Junts party from Catalonia that failed the two decrees with which the left-wing minority government wanted to alleviate the severe housing shortage.

Those around Sánchez seem to draw a clear conclusion: After a politically devastating summer, there is now a golden opportunity to turn the tide, according to reports from the leadership of the socialist PSOE. The disappointed Spaniards could help Sánchez get out of the defensive. The head of government had come under increasing pressure due to the storm on the North African exclave of Ceuta and allegations of corruption in his immediate surroundings. During the UN general debate in New York, the socialist had hardly spoken about migration, but spoke even more about the pensioner Mariacarmen Abascal.

In Spain, the two packages of housing policy measures that his coalition hastily passed but did not get through parliament were called “Mariacarmen” decrees. They bear the first name of the eighty-seven-year-old who was forced to leave her Madrid apartment, where she had lived for decades, in September after being evicted. As a symbolic figure of the new protest movement, the pensioner awakens new hope in the Spanish left.

The left-wing minority government actually wanted to make a name for itself with the reform before the next regular election. According to the first decree, there should be no evictions for tenants without alternative housing until 2030, especially for vulnerable tenants like the Madrid pensioner. With a few exceptions, real estate funds should be prohibited from purchasing additional apartments until 2028. The second decree was intended to introduce permanent rental contracts.

But the Junts party of Carles Puigdemont, the separatist leader who fled to Belgium, which only has seven of the 350 MPs, voted against it with the PP and Vox. Junts believes that the decrees could have the “opposite effect”: they would reduce the supply of affordable rental housing, drive up prices and fail to adequately protect small landlords. On the other side of the political spectrum, it is not only the left-wing Podemos party that is calling for the expropriation of hundreds of thousands of apartments owned by allegedly greedy “vulture funds”.

Pedro Sánchez is examining all options, said from the Moncloa Palace, the Prime Minister's official residence. Since the socialist came to government in 2018 through a vote of no confidence with an open outcome, he had not shied away from any political risks. Instead of hesitating for a long time, he always attacked and survived.