Diana Morant blames PP, Vox, and Junts for the fall of the norm that curbed evictions

The Minister of Science, Innovation and Universities, Diana Morant, assured this Monday in València, in statements to the media on the occasion of the General Policy Debate held in Les Corts, that when the PSOE came to power, a regulation came into force to prevent evictions and that this protection was maintained, with successive extensions, until a few months ago PP, Vox and Junts voted for it to lapse.

"Therefore, it cannot be said that the Government has had eight years to protect people and has not done so because we have been protecting people until Vox, PP and Junts said no," defended Morant, who thus rejected the idea that the Executive of Pedro Sánchez has had enough margin without having acted against evictions.

The memory of Gandia and the mention of Maricarmen

Asked about that criticism, the minister made "an amendment to that statement" and recalled her time as mayor in Gandia (Valencia). "I was mayor in 2015 and fifteen days later I stood before an eviction in Gandia (Valencia) and took the woman and child who lived in that house and found them another because in that year there was no rule that prevented evictions even for the most vulnerable people or those who had no housing alternative," she said.

Morant also maintained that, when PP, Vox and Junts voted against the Government's royal decree-law on housing, "many of us knew that this was going to happen and perhaps there is an intention behind this." In that context, she alluded to the regional president of Madrid, Isabel Díaz Ayuso, stating that she has "zero empathy in the case of Maricarmen or any evicted person."

"But let no one have any doubt," she emphasized, "that this is happening because of the right and the far-right in our country and, unfortunately, we do not have a parliamentary majority," stressed the minister, who insisted that the Executive will try to ensure that "again the parliamentary majority empathizes with the situation of the people and lives up to the neighbors of all Spain."

Capping prices and applying the Housing Law

Regarding access to housing, the also leader of the Valencian socialists appealed to Junts, recalling that "it speaks of Catalonia, because there are also Catalans who can be evicted." "Governing for people is governing for people who need the State protecting a right such as housing and the Government will continue to do so," she affirmed.

Morant warned, however, that "the Government cannot do everything" and specified that the executive power is the Government, while the legislative power corresponds to the Cortes Generales. "The Government is the executive power and the legislative power is the Cortes Generales and there we must ask everyone for responsibility, not only the left-wing parties, but also those who vote against in Congress and cause Maricarmen to have been evicted," she said.

In this framework, the minister reiterated that, if she becomes president of the Generalitat, she will cap housing prices, a measure that, she recalled, is already applied by Catalonia, Navarra, the Basque Country and the mayor of Barcelona, Jaume Collboni. "Here we could be doing it in Valencia, in Castellón, in Alicante and declaring stressed areas. That is already there," she maintained.

She also defended that this Monday's debate could serve to vote in favor of the application of the Housing Law, a norm that, she explained, has created new instruments so that autonomous communities can protect citizens. "Unfortunately, most autonomous communities in Spain are governed by the PP," she lamented.

Morant added that, when she is president of the Generalitat, she will apply the law, cap rental prices, declare stressed areas and launch "an anti-vulture fund plan" so that, she said, "the Aznar family cannot currently be buying an entire block of homes in Valencia to speculate."

Yolanda Díaz's demands and the lack of a majority

Finally, asked about the demands made to the PSOE by the second vice-president and Minister of Labor and Social Economy, Yolanda Díaz, the minister considered that her words respond to "impotence." Morant admitted that she also feels "impotence and frustration" and acknowledged that the Government must demand more from itself.

"But we also have to demand more from those who can do more and are not doing it," she remarked, before insisting that the Executive must try everything, although laws must be approved in the Congress of Deputies. "Then we will have to ask, for example, Mr. Pérez Llorca or Mr. Feijóo, why this is happening in Spain," she concluded.