LIVE | Sánchez faces key hours for the approval of housing decrees: latest on the uncertainty of Podemos and Junts' vote

The PNV announced this Thursday that it will vote in favor, albeit with "critical" support, of the housing decree that incorporates most of the proposed measures, understanding that it "protects vulnerable people" and "improves the situation of small owners".

In a statement, the Basque party specified that its position does not imply full adherence to the content of the norm, but rather limited support for those provisions it considers useful. As explained, the text is a "specific patch with many shortcomings", so it maintains serious reservations about its scope and about the "real" impact it may have on the housing market.

Pedro Sánchez has told Congress that it must decide "who it protects": "The people who live in the houses or those who make a fortune from them; small owners or vulture funds." For this reason, he urged parliamentarians to vote in favor of the housing decrees.

The Minister of Inclusion, Social Security and Migration, Elma Saiz, was optimistic about the vote that will take place next Friday on the housing decrees. Furthermore, she regretted that the PP has ceased to be a useful opposition party with its refusal of the decrees.

Maitane Ipiñazar, secretary of the PNV Executive, confirmed that her party has not yet made a decision regarding the housing decrees that will be voted on next Friday in the Congress of Deputies. However, she stressed that they will not vote in favor of decrees that equate vulture funds with small property owners.

Mónica García, Minister of Health, recalled that Sumar registered the second law decree —which automatically extends housing rental contracts— as a bill in Parliament. "From Más Madrid, we registered it less than a year ago because we believe it is the structural measure through which speculation is creeping into housing," Mónica García explained in an interview on Telecinco.

Furthermore, she described the images recorded in Puerta del Sol of people camping and asking for the housing decrees to be approved as "wonderful."

During the negotiation of the housing decree, the PNV has asked for a "clear differentiation between habitual, temporary, and tourist rentals." In this vein, they have requested that tourist apartments be considered "an economic activity and taxed as such," for which they have asked that they be taxed with the general VAT rate corresponding to the sector or that the reduced rate be applied.

 Montse Mínguez, spokesperson for the PSOE Federal Executive, declared this Thursday that it is now Congress that is responsible for approving the decree-laws on housing. Furthermore, she defended Pedro Sánchez's government by assuring that the Executive "has done everything" to promote the measures. 

"It has never occurred to me to tell the mobilization what it has to do," said Verónica Barbero, spokesperson for Sumar in Congress. "I believe that they have been the ones who have brought these norms to Congress, they have known how to do it perfectly and we fully trust that they will continue to know how to do it," she added in an interview on 'RNE'.

Ione Belarra, general secretary of Podemos, confirms her party's vote in favor of the requests that the Tenants' Union has made for the approval of the two housing decrees.

The Confederation of Tenant Unions has described the two housing decrees to be debated this Friday in Congress as insufficient. However, they have asked for the approval of both measures, as they consider that they can serve as a starting point to promote deeper reforms in the future.