The Popular Party has found a new problem to add to its speech in defense of private property. To the phenomenon of squatting, of which Alberto Núñez Feijóo has been warning for months, he will now add squatting, “a problem that has even been created by a mafia around this figure” and which is increasing, he says, with the new housing law that The Government has agreed with ERC and Bildu.
This was transmitted this Tuesday by the Platform of People Affected by the Occupation to the national leadership of the PP during a meeting behind closed doors and this was confirmed 20 minutes later by party leaders present at the meeting. “We are going to broaden the focus of the squatting to the squatting and assume that there is a mafia.”
In addition to helping those affected by including this problem on the media agenda, the popular ones committed themselves to the association to protect the owners with three clear messages: that the position of the PP in this debate is to “protect the victims”, so those present at the meeting are “aligned” in their struggle; that Feijóo has included in his 28M electoral program various actions against squatting, and that the new housing law “is not” his law, for which reason the PP promises to rectify it if it comes to government next year.
As the association's spokesman explained to this medium, and now popular leaders assume, the phenomenon of squatting has become a new threat to the owners, because although there are legal tools to evict a squatter in the first hours, these are not the same when it comes to a tenant who has stopped paying the landlord.
Management sources explain that if the housing problem is resolved by making more housing available to citizens, “it does not make sense that whoever squats in a tourist apartment is evicted because it is a commercial relationship, but if it is a apartment under a regular rental regime an average of two years is needed to kick them out”.
Thus, the PP warns that the new housing law “is more pro-squatting”, because it further protects these defaulters, turning the owner into the victim who “suffers financially and personally, since he has to fight for get your home back. In addition, as popular sources explain, many owners end up not denouncing and reaching an economic agreement with the tenants.. “The solution does not have to be that each one finds it for himself or pays an amount.”
For the PP, the formula involves punishing this phenomenon by law and offering tools to owners, without leaving vulnerable people aside.. For this reason, in his 28M electoral program, Alberto Núñez Feijóo proposes evictions within a maximum period of 24 hours and removing the tax burden from the owner who has the squatted home, creating municipal offices that have legal advice for the neighbors and a telephone 24-hour citizen service and create Municipal Police units specialized in the fight against squatting. “People want an anti-squatting law that says that squatting is a crime,” defended this Wednesday the PP Housing spokesperson in Congress, Ana Zurita.