The coordinator of the Bloco de Esquerda (BE) this Saturday defended the imposition of limits on the rent increase for 2024 as the government admitted its housing incompetence, which is “the biggest problem” for people.
“With this request for help from the European Commission, the government finally gives the ultimate recognition of its incompetence to tackle the housing problem,” said Mariana Mortágua.
The BE coordinator defended that “it will not be the European Commission that will land in Portela to come to Portugal to check rents or finish the works that the State and the Government had promised to do, the construction of cafes and which they have not done.” “.
in your understandingr: “it is the responsibility of the government and António Costa (…) to keep his promises” and “solving the housing crisis is the responsibility of António Costa”.
Mariana Mortágua spoke to journalists in Viseu, where she visited the producers’ market to learn more about the reality, in preparation for the Socialism Forum marking the return of BE, scheduled for the “city of Viriato” between September 8 and 10.
The blogger put forward the proposals that the party will make, including that “rent growth in 2024 will be frozen at the value of 2021, before the wave of inflation”.
The increase should be applied “not only to existing contracts and their renewal, but also to new contracts,” he clarified, acknowledging that the measure “will not solve the housing problem by itself, but it can provide a minimum of stability . “To people for the future.
“Housing is the biggest problem people are currently facing,” said Mariana Mortágua, not only because of the rise in interest rates, but also because of “the difficulty of finding a home, both to buy and to rent.”
In his opinion, “there are one, two generations of people who cannot leave their parents’ house and who cannot have life plans and that housing has become half, more than half, sometimes almost the entire family budget.”
In this sense, he defended that “determination is needed for very strong measures not only to contain prices, but also to bring them down” and the BE has “two essential proposals” to achieve this.
“Lower interest rates on home loans. We cannot tolerate banks making millions of profits at the cost of the lives of so many people who cannot repay their loans (…) and banks should be forced to lower interest rates in exchange for their own profit,” he suggested.
A second measure concerns ‘rent control, through rent ceilings, ceilings that are reasonable, that fit the surface of the city, the typology, the size of the houses’, because ‘800 euros for a house in Viseu is unaffordable’. said, taking into account the purchasing power of the region.
“Just as it is unaffordable to pay 1,500 euros for a house in Lisbon, because the salaries do not pay this rent and it is therefore necessary to pay the rent. These are two simple measures that can be applied now,” he said.
Source: DN
