Housing: Home Platform To Live will meet with PS, PCP, BE and Free

A casa para Viver platform will be received by the parties PS, PCP, BE and Livre, throughout this week, before the national demonstration by the right to housing called for Saturday.

In a statement, the platform – which includes a hundred associations and collectives and has already mobilized thousands of people on the streets on several dates, over the last three years – further points out that “it does not wait for invitations” and will ask the President of the Republic, the Government and the PSD (main party of the majority in the executive).

The platform – which called demonstrations across the country for the next Saturday, “in defense of the right to housing and regulatory policies that actually meet the needs of those in need of a home” – refuses to accept a State Budget that cuts about EUR 1,844 million in public investment in housing (face to 2026).

“ Decades of the same housing policies have brought the country to the crisis that we are experiencing today. To get out of it, it is not enough for the political leaders to make proposals: they have to listen to those who follow the difficulties of the people every day, and take seriously the solutions that movements and organizations have long defended”, urges the platform.

Parliament approved the new law on rent proposed by the Government on September 30, the day the platform called a demonstration for November 14.

Since then, three dozen cities have scheduled demonstrations for Saturday at different times.

The House for Living considers that, with the approval of the new law, the parliament gave “a blank check” to the Government to “legislate, by decree, against those who live in rented homes”.

The proposal for a government law to change the urban lease regime was approved in general, with the vote in favour of PSD, IL and CDS-PP and the abstention of the Aquida, which signed an agreement to introduce changes in the discussion in the specialty.

More flexible contracts and faster evictions are some of the measures included in the bill.

With the proposed reform, which completes the package of measures to combat the housing crisis launched a year ago by the government, the eviction can be initiated after two months of overdue rents (instead of the three current ones).

In addition, the Government dropped the 2% increase brake on a new contract (in relation to the previous contract), except for persons over 65 or disabled with a disability equal to or greater than 60% and annual income less than EUR 64,400, and landlords may now require three (instead of two) advance and no value limit.

A year ago, the government decided to put an end to the concept of affordable income and to create moderate income, placing it at between 400 and 2,300 euros, as it also generated great challenge.