Edouard Philippe warns against the housing shortage which could be “a social bomb”

"There is no possibility that we will resolve the questions of purchasing power, of the perspective of a working society, if we do not give back a little room for maneuver and if we do not loosen the grip on housing in France today", he declared during the MoDem back-to-school university in Guidel (Morbihan).

The former Prime Minister pointed to “three causes”: “a construction crisis, a rental supply crisis and a demand crisis”.

Regarding the "crisis of rental supply", "in a whole series of areas (...) the rapid development of Airbnb creates a phenomenon of eviction of neighbors for the benefit of tourists, a phenomenon which prohibits "have access to a rental market", judged Mr. Philippe.

“There is something there which is a social bomb, a human bomb which must be resolved” and cities like Amsterdam, London or the United States “have understood the need for regulation”, he added .

Regarding the energy performance diagnosis, the measurement “starts from a fair analysis”. But “taking apartments classified as G out of the rental market (in 2025, Editor’s note) means mechanically reducing the rental offer for the most modest”. “A dead end”, developed the boss of Horizons.

“We must de-stress the rental market without giving in to our ecological ambition, which is absolutely imperative. But we cannot see this subject coming quickly: 2025 is tomorrow,” he said. insisted.

Overall, said Mr. Philippe, “we must change the logic of housing policy”. "We don't have very good results and yet we spend a lot of money on it", "nearly 40 billion euros per year".

He advocates in particular “developing public and private land holdings, to ensure that capital is not inactive”. According to him, it is also necessary to “renovate rather than build, densify rather than spread out”. “We must densify our cities if we want to avoid using agricultural land or natural spaces, spreading out our towns so much that we cut off all social interactions.”