The government presents its controversial housing law

The Minister Delegate for Housing Guillaume Kasbarian repeatedly wants to create the conditions for a “supply shock” to better house the French, particularly the middle classes.

The first household budget item, housing is in fact experiencing an unprecedented crisis. New construction is at a standstill, the number of building permits granted having not been this low in more than 30 years.

This setback has repercussions on all stages of the residential journey: accession to property is more unaffordable than ever, finding accommodation to rent is an obstacle course... and further down the social ladder, the The number of households waiting for HLM has reached a record level of 2,6 million, while 4,2 million people are poorly housed.

This crisis comes partly from the economic situation, with more expensive construction materials or rising interest rates; for another of decisions by the State, which reduced expenditure or strengthened standards which increase construction costs.

There is no financial aid for the production of housing in this law, the time being for budgetary austerity.

"What we need is a relaunch of the construction of social housing. And the provisions made in this text are made within a limited budgetary framework", tackles UDI senator Amel Gacquerre, who also deplores that the subject taxation is not addressed.

Outcry

Guillaume Kasbarian intends to act on four levers, says the ministry: "offering new tools to mayors to build, simplifying administrative procedures to build faster, freeing up investment in affordable housing, facilitating access to housing for the French".

But the first version of the bill, consulted in mid-April by AFP, sparked an outcry, in particular its provisions concerning social housing.

The National Housing Council (CNH), bringing together the many players in the world of housing (professional associations, social landlords, elected officials, tenant associations, etc.), mainly voted against, a vote which only 'advisory value.

The five main HLM tenant associations immediately denounced “a bill that preys on the poor”.

The additional latitude given to mayors to allocate new HLM fueled their fears of “electoral patronage (...) or even (of) national preference”.

They also denounce the planned tightening of rules for HLM tenants exceeding the resource ceilings, who will more often see their rent increased and will be more easily expelled from social housing beyond a certain threshold.

"To go where? These are still small resources for a household. And the steps between social housing and private housing, in certain territories, they are very, very high!", pleads to AFP the general delegate of the Abbé-Pierre Christophe Robert Foundation.

He is also concerned about the announced relaxation of the SRU law, which imposes social housing quotas on cities. The executive hopes that out-of-the-way municipalities will be able, in the future, to integrate intermediate housing, mainly intended for the middle classes, into part of their production to help them catch up.

“Why want to weaken the SRU law, give a bonus to those who have not applied it sufficiently for 20, 25 years, while others have stuck to it?” asks Christophe Robert.

“The law comes, in a pragmatic way, to propose a solution other than that of repression, with fines which in fact do not work”, retorts the majority deputy Bastien Marchive who defends a “social justice” text.

The text will first be examined in the Senate, around mid-June.