Living in a caravan can be disruptive and even fun, as long as it is a personal choice. The problem is when you are condemned to reside there because you cannot afford to live in a normal house. It happens to more and more workers in the tourism sector that, in places in the Balearic or Canary Islands during high season, they cannot find a room at a price that is not a ruin.
There is no longer any doubt that housing is one of the great deficits of this country. The law that came to regulate the sector, approved at the last minute at the end of the last legislature, was a necessary regulation, but it was immediately seen that it was insufficient to solve the shortage in the sector. The best thing that has happened to Spain’s endemic problem of lack of decent and affordable housing is that this issue has emerged in all its splendor and today it is already present in the political debate. Housing once again occupies an entire ministry since November 2023, after the six-year interval, between 2004 and 2010, in which it also existed as such under the presidency of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero.
From its vantage point of economic control, the Bank of Spain addresses the issue in its annual report and, as it became known this Tuesday, confirms the urgent need to enable 600,000 more homes in the shortest possible time. It has been a failure of the central and regional administrations, incapable of creating officially protected housing. The Government has announced its intention to create 184,000 homes in this term, but, even if it succeeds, it will not solve this problem.
The solution, apart from reaching the broadest possible political agreement, should include the participation of the private sector. Construction companies and real estate companies should not be seen as an enemy by the Administration, but as a collaborator in the common objective. Obviously they want to make money, but it is legal for them to do so legally if in exchange they contribute to building thousands and thousands of social housing. Therefore, yes to making a living and no to speculation. Because homes don’t build themselves.
