Spain protests flare after housing bill rejected: Will it cause snap poll?

Spain’s parliament on Friday voted down two emergency decrees introduced by Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez’s minority left-wing coalition that were intended to address a growing housing affordability crisis. The government said the measures would protect vulnerable renters, limit real-estate speculation, tighten rules on short-term leases and incentivize rental and housing construction.

One decree sought to bar evictions of vulnerable people and impose stricter limits on short-term rentals, while the other would have caused leases to renew automatically when they expired, effectively making them indefinite unless a landlord paid a year’s rent to terminate. Despite appeals by Sánchez for lawmakers to put people’s needs ahead of politics, the measures failed to secure a majority in the 350-seat lower house.

The decrees were opposed by the centre-right Popular Party and far-right Vox, and were also rejected by the Catalan separatist party Junts, which argued the measures risked shrinking the rental supply and worsening prices. Government ministers and supporters argued the vote sided with rent-seeking interests and left many tenants exposed to rising rents and evictions.

The parliamentary defeat has sparked widespread demonstrations. Tens of thousands rallied in cities across Spain, a wave of protests that began after the eviction of an 87-year-old Madrid resident, María del Carmen Abascal, whose building was bought by an investment fund that reportedly hiked her rent. While most demonstrations were peaceful, authorities in Valencia used rubber bullets and tear gas to disperse some protesters after a small group entered a cultural landmark.

Local media have reported that Sánchez is considering calling snap elections as early as November in response to the political fallout, though Spain’s current legislative term is due to end next summer. Academic commentators quoted before the vote warned the emergency decrees would not solve medium- or long-term supply problems without a sustained public social housing strategy, and that some provisions could place burdens on small landlords.