![]() ![]() It prevented 250 evictions in the city in 2019 and hundreds more around the rest of Spain, Mas de Xaxas added. The PAH, which launched 10 years ago in Barcelona in response to Spain’s mortgage crisis, offers residents free legal advice at weekly meetings, raises awareness of upcoming evictions on social media and on the day protests outside targeted homes. “They (family members) are all put in one room – no access to a kitchen, no access for the kids to any space for them to study or to play,” he lamented, adding that they could remain in that state for years. Zafar and his family, like many families who have been evicted, will have been temporarily rehoused in a hostel in Barcelona and will probably be moved every few weeks or months, Mas de Xaxas explained. ![]() the government allows the market to run wild,” Mas de Xaxas told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.Ī spokesman for the Spanish Ministry of Development did not respond to a request for comment on its national social housing policy. “Other countries have rent controls, Spain does not. said in a statement, and ordered the government to compensate Alban.Īfter tense negotiations with his landlord, the housing activists, social workers, and court and city hall representatives, he and his family were told to leave their home. ![]() Spain needs to create a legal framework to “prevent similar violations in the future”, the U.N. Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights said the government had violated the family’s right to housing and not recognised their vulnerability. She proceeded to apply for social housing, but was turned down on the grounds that anyone illegally occupying a property is not eligible, according to the complaint. When the bank that did own the property realised she was living there, it started eviction proceedings. In the complaint Alban filed with the U.N., the single mother stated that she had discovered the person who claimed to be the landlord turned out not to be the property’s legal owner and so she stopped paying rent. The issue garnered international attention in October 2019 when the United Nations condemned Spain’s government for its hand in the eviction of Maribel Viviana Lopez Alban and her six children from their apartment in Madrid. Local government data revealed that in the wealthy Catalonia region alone, there were about 13,900 home evictions in 2018, nearly 5% more than in the previous year. “The housing crisis situation in Spain is comparable to less developed countries where they have seen big displacements,” said Santi Mas de Xaxas, spokesman for the Mortgage Victims’ Platform (PAH), which runs Stop Desahucios.Īverage rental prices in Barcelona have risen by a third in the last five years, according to city hall statistics. Thousands of families are evicted each month across Spain, as a combination of overtourism, rising immigration and a growing urban population push up housing prices, leaving many tenants unable to afford rent, say housing rights advocates.Īs local activists call on the government for solutions, advocacy groups like Stop Desahucios (“Stop Evictions”) are finding ways to help people keep their homes, with some comparing the situation to a refugee crisis. we have lived here for five years,” said Zafar - who did not want to disclose his full name - as he took a deep breath. “The landlord is up there now and I am waiting to see what happens. ![]() BARCELONA (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Cars and buses hurtled by as Zafar stood frozen on the spot, legal documents in hand, glancing anxiously at his apartment block on one of Barcelona’s busiest roads.Īctivists from Stop Desahucios, a nationwide association that fights for housing rights, began gathering outside the building to try to prevent the father of four and his family from being evicted that same day. ![]()
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