The European Parliament urges the Spanish government to reduce “the unacceptable number of evictions”

Strasbourg (CNA).- MEPs urged the Spanish government “to use all the instruments at its disposal” to reduce “the unacceptable number of evictions”. The Members of the Euro Parliament approved this Thursday in Strasbourg a resolution which aims to “supervise” whether the communitarian legislation in relation to mortgage loans is correctly applied in order to “solve the current problems and prevent abusive practices”. The document also suggest the creation of a list which would contain those banks involved in “bad practice”, for example, those who were involved in the ‘preferential shares’ scandal, which offered high rates of return but ended up with thousands of savers unable to recover their money four years ago.

The resolution was written in the Committee on Petitions after the appearance of many members of associations of people affected by mortgage loansand has been approved with 383 in favour, 266 against and 10 abstentions. It asks the European Commission to “supervise” the “effective” application of the measures adopted by the Spanish government in order to “solve the current problems and prevent abusive practices”. The resolution also requires Brussels to make sure that the communitarian legislation in relation to mortgage loans is correctly applied.

The MEPs urged the Spanish government “to use all the instruments at its disposal” to reduce “the unacceptable number of evictions”. The resolution also demands that the banks “avoid evicting those families who live in their unique residence” and urged them to “adopt measures to restructure the debt and the social rent”. Moreover, the MEPs asked the European Commission to create a “black list” with all the banks that are “frequently involved in bad practices”.  

Following this, the document also considers the ‘preferential shares’ scandal in Spain, which offered high rates of return but ended up with thousands of savers unable to recover their money four years ago. The resolution asks Brussels to take into account “the doubts expressed by the EU’s Advocate General” regarding “the legality of the measures adopted by the Spanish government” to avoid abusive practices in the mortgages sector.

Spain’s Constitutional Court to stop Catalan regulation on this issue

The European resolution was approved on the same day that Spain’s Constitutional Court accepted an appeal from the Spanish Government which may suspend the Catalan regulation regarding this issue. Law 24/2015 approved by the Catalan government included emergency measures to deal with urgent situations where there is high risk of eviction. The measures were oriented to avoid evictions as much as possible and combat the risk of social and residential exclusion. It also includes the obligatory application of the social rent, the payment on account and the immediate relocation of the evicted families. Another regulation likely to be suspended by Spain’s Constitutional Court is that oriented to fine the owners of empty flats. Both regulations emerged from a Popular Legislative Initiative and were approved by the Catalan government with the support of most of the groups.

The Spanish government has already announced its intention to appeal the law and described it as “an affront to the propriety concept established in the Constitution” and an example of “excess of jurisdictional competences”.