Call by the Independentist Left for the right to Housing
On the occasion of the call of the right to decent housing that will take place in Valencia next Saturday 23 December in Saint Agustí’s Square, we, the organizations of the Independentist Left, make a call at the participation in this mobilization.
We highlight the importance of this popular mobilization and we believe that everybody should participate in the demonstration for the following reasons:
1. The problem of the lack of housing is everyday becoming more of a reality. The prices of the houses have grown in an excessive way (1 square meter in the city of Valencia is above the 2000 euros per square meter), which means that the majority of the people can’t access housing for ownership. At present housing has stopped being a ‘right’ but instead becoming now a business.
2. At present we, the Catalan Countries, are suffering the crudest
consequences of a ferocious capitalism:
2•1 They have condemned us to being a country of services, which provokes an exclusive specialization in the tourism.
This fact has some devastating consequences for our earth:
urban speculation: fields of golf, macro housing developments, shopping centres, wind power farms, tracks of ski...
In a nutshell housing speculation has provoked a situation in which each time more houses are being built all over the Country, but the chances for us to be able to access housing are very slim and even more the possibilities to own your own one.
2•2 The deplorable conditions: The service industry also incites deplorable conditions upon our lives: our jobs becoming each time more temporary (33% of the workers in the Spanish State hold temporary contracts), our salaries do not increase at the same level as everything else does (food, water, gas, light, mortgages...) All this ensures that we have to pour more than the 50% of our salaries into buying a house or that mortgages do not stop increasing which equally hampers young people from becoming more independent or to be able to own a house.
2•3 Debt Crisis: the debt levels this year alone reached 110% of the average family income. Nowadays, the mortgages are being negotiated for a thirty year period or more. And in Valencia, we are now paying more than 600 euros each month for a mortgage. This amount rises every day, which pushes the popular classes into a situation of maximum vulnerability of the family economy.
3. At the same time in which the difficulties to access housing are arising so are the empty flats and derelict buildings. In the city of Valencia there are around 65464 empty properties out of a total of 377248, this demonstrates once again that there is an abandonment of the housing and carelessness by the administrations on rehabilitating these empty flats.
4. Within this context, we find that both collectives, women and the youth are especially punished: Women are subjected to a patriarchal system that discriminates against them by the simple fact of being women: their monthly salaries are 15.7%
inferior to those of men. The unemployment rate in women is higher than that of the men.
Moreover, they are usually employed within the service industry, the economic sector with more temporary and deplorable conditions.
With the current prices, women spend more than 54% of their salary in to paying for housing.
Another collective especially discriminated against is that of the youth: their difficulties are to be able to access in housing as they see themselves condemned to spend more than 50% of their salaries if they want to access housing in Valencia. The temporary and deplorable conditions of their jobs increases, even more, their difficulty in being able to live independently or being able to access ownership of their housing. At present 78,6% of the youth still live in their parent’s houses since it is impossible for them to buy their own homes.
5. All these factors have clear culprits who are necessary to point out and to condemn: politicians, employers, builders, banks, estates agents....
Those persons responsible to lead, from their political and the economical power, the fate of our lives, only look for their personal enrichment and to pursue this goal they speculate with land, people or with education.
Nothing escapes these leeches like Lubasa, Llanera or Ortiz who decide the rules of the game and the future of our people, our lives...
6. In front of this situation, from the different organizations of the
Independentist left we believe that some emergency measures are needed to halt this problem:
- It is necessary that there will be renovations of our most historical neighbourhoods such as Russafa, Ciutat Vella or the Cabanyal that have been left to their luck.
- It is necessary to create a social pool of housing, through the sanction and/or seizure of the owners of empty buildings and houses, wide enough to provide decent housing to anyone who applies for one.
- It is necessary to intervene strongly in the housing market so that price of housing balances with peoples wages.
- Is necessary that the housing and the neighbourhoods offer the same quality of life, regardless of the wages of those who may obtain them.
Because of all this, from the Independentist Left, we encourage all citizens to participate with us in this call. Mobilization is the weapon of the working class along with the daily fight throughout our neighbourhoods, towns and villages.
STOP DEPLORABLE HOUSING!
STOP URBAN SPECULATION!
END MAFIA ESTATE AGENTS!
FORWARD WITH THE POPULAR FIGHT!
Valencia, 16th of December of 2006
Independentist Left
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