Young people in Spain join strike over housing crisis — Al Jazeera

In Spain, tens of thousands of young people have been protesting the acute housing crisis in recent weeks, and on Wednesday many of them joined a nationwide strike. The country’s largest trade unions called for the action under the slogan “Wages, Housing and Prices,” Al Jazeera reports.

The forced eviction of 87-year-old Maricarmen Abascal from an apartment in Madrid, where she had lived for seven decades, intensified public outrage. Her corporate landlord raised the rent to an amount the woman could not afford. Abascal died in hospital on the day the owners agreed to allow her to return to the apartment.

Housing shortage and parliament’s decision

The left-wing coalition government submitted two emergency decrees to parliament to protect vulnerable tenants, but right-wing parties rejected them. Against the backdrop of the housing crisis, the government announced early elections for November 29. The Bank of Spain estimates the housing shortage at 750,000 units and says it could rise to 1 million next year.

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Protest participants said that due to high rental prices, they live with their parents or share small apartments with several roommates. Twenty-four-year-old data analyst Haris Javid Sharif lives in Barcelona with his parents, brother and sister in a 44-square-metre apartment. According to him, after the pandemic, the family lost its previous home because of debt for five months of rent.

Renting without guarantees

Social worker Iratxe Gonzalez lives in Madrid with three other people in a 45-square-metre apartment. She pays $400 in rent from a monthly salary of $1,200 and has a one-year contract, which she considers unstable because of the risk of a rent increase or eviction.

Teacher Ignacio Redrado noted that the average age at which young people in Spain leave their parents’ home is 30. Protesters are demanding open-ended rental contracts and more social housing. NGO worker Arturo Leon, who shares an apartment in Barcelona with four other people, said that his bedroom measures two by 2.6 metres, while the landlord threatens to raise the rent despite the lack of a contract and defects in the apartment.