A great banging of pots for housing at all city councils: the next move of the Tenants' Union

Barcelona"It is key that thousands of people demand tomorrow, Thursday, in front of all the town halls in the country, that the Congress of Deputies validates the two decrees". This is the message from the Tenants' Union to call on citizens to put pressure so that on Friday political parties give the green light to the two decrees that the Spanish government has approved in the council of ministers and that include a battery of measures to limit speculative buying and suspend evictions.

Looking ahead to Thursday, the union has made a call for pot-banging protests to be organized at 8 PM in front of all the town halls in the State to demand that the two housing decrees be approved. "May no party dare to betray with a vote against the social outcry expressed these days in the streets", they warn in a statement.

On the other hand, and regardless of whether the decrees are approved or not, the union has also called for a demonstration on Saturday at 7 PM at Pius XXII square in L'Hospitalet de Llobregat. They assert that "an emergency rule, like these decrees, will not be able to reverse decades of policies that have turned housing into a business" and call for mobilization this weekend to take advantage of "a window of historical opportunity to change housing policies once and for all." The mobilization will also feature two columns that will depart from Barcelona and Sabadell to end up at the demonstration in L'Hospitalet.

A hundred campers in Plaça Catalunya

The call for these two new mobilizations comes after a hundred people spent the night in a camp at Plaça Catalunya in Barcelona to demand the right to housing. The movement has been a reflection of the camp that has occupied Madrid's Puerta del Sol since Saturday and which many are already calling a new 15-M. Tonight there were about fifty tents set up and it is expected that more people will join throughout the day today.

The camp was organized through social media and the organizers explain that they are "a group of people from different housing unions, assemblies, and individuals with a common concern" who have united "in the face of the difficulties imposed on us in accessing housing." For their part, the Tenants' Union (Sindicat de Llogateres) states that they did not lead the proposal to camp, but they consider that "all initiatives are welcome." They explain that this afternoon they will meet with the people camping to "explore how to collaborate from now on."