The left-wing Podemos MP, Cristina Gómez, has proposed expropriating flats from large US property owners in the Balearics in response to the imposition of tariffs by Donald Trump’s government. She made the announcement on Monday prior to the plenary session of the regional parliament, where she also put forward some measures that, in her opinion, would make it possible to lower the current price of housing on the islands.
“If the United States has decided to defend its security and autonomy by turning inwards in the commercial sphere, it may be that the time has come for us to show that we can also defend our people,” she said. She called for the expropriation of all flats owned by American “vulture investment funds” in the Balearics - one of which she claims has around 960 rented properties.
Gómez also responded to some of the proposals that came out of the demonstration for the right to housing that took place last Saturday across Spain and which she celebrated as a success. First, she said, “an immediate drop in rental prices, of between 40 and 50 percent”, something that is “absolutely calculated to be the non-speculative price”.
“Approximately, in the free market, at least 50 per cent is being charged over the stipulated prices” in the Ministry of Housing index, so the proposed reduction would also be “absolutely justified”, she argued. Another possible measure mentioned by the Unidas Podemos representative was the repossession of empty homes, which in the Balearics would amount to nearly five hundred in the register of large property owners alone, she said.
In her opinion, the policies implemented by the centre right PP government are supporting “speculative retention” by not providing the tools to expropriate these empty homes. “Who’s to say the same thing won’t happen with these new homes they’re building?” she asked. Gómez has also called for a ban on eviction companies, as she considers that they “take advantage of the social drama by using coercive techniques”, and evictions of families with no alternative housing.
“There are mechanisms to compensate those owners who are unable to collect their rents. So, enough of the crocodile tears,” she said. Finally, the MP again criticised the PP for its criticism of the lack of housing policy during the last legislatures, an argument that “nobody believes”.
"The public housing programme was very strong as long as we had the land. Now there is neither land nor public housing. Prohens (PP Balearic president) is deceiving us and has decided that the entire housing policy would favour large developers and speculators,” she concluded.
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The Woman is an absolute idiot. I say again, rental prices are where they are because of a dictated market. Increase wages, build more houses, expand urban land. Everything has gone up except wages in the last years. Really if your groceries have risen 50%, Electricity has risen 50%, Petrol etc all up over 7 years, why wouldnt rents increase ? Its an absolute abomination likened to communist Russia that she blames a free market for a housing crisis. Look at rents in ski resorts or other european cities, the difference is workers are paid well. Also has she attacked the Mallorquian second home owners that are plentiful ? These people are running the country..... Good God.