The acting Minister of Housing, Sebastián Franquis, stresses that in the last three years more than 1,300 launches have been avoided
SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, June 21 (EUROPA PRESS) –
The Ministry of Public Works, Transport and Housing of the Government of the Canary Islands, through the acting counselor Sebastián Franquis, signed this Wednesday a new collaboration agreement with the General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ) and the Canarian Federation of Municipalities (FECAM). to establish a protocol for action, in a joint and coordinated manner, in situations of eviction of vulnerable families in the Canary Islands and to avoid, whenever possible, throwing them out.
“We are signing an agreement that adapts to a specific reality that we are experiencing in the Canary Islands and that basically seeks to avoid evictions in our Autonomous Community with the different instruments that the administration has. Therefore, we are increasing that social shield that already existed so that in the next four years families in the Canary Islands with difficulties are much more protected than they were until today,” said Sebastián Franquis.
Along these lines, he said that “this is a good time because on the 30th of this month the protection period established by the State by Royal Decree ends, so what is done is to extend that period and, in addition, it is extended general way to all vulnerable families, not exclusively to people affected by COVID or the war in Ukraine, as stated in the Royal Decree”.
The agreement, which has also been signed by the president of the Fecam, María Concepción Brito, and which will be signed later by the president of the CGPJ, Carlos Lesmes, has a validity of four years, extendable and will improve public management in the event of an eviction through the intervention of the Canary Islands Housing Institute (ICAVI) and the social services of the Canary Islands municipalities.
The agreement contemplates the immediate stoppage in cases of eviction due to non-payment of economically and socially vulnerable families –those with incomes of less than 1.5 times the Public Indicator of Multiple Effects Income (IPREM), that is, 11,862 euros per year –; situations of dependency or disability; victims of gender violence and large families where, in the opinion of the Judicial Authority, the need for intervention by the municipal social services or the Government of the Canary Islands is determined to achieve a solution to the launch.
In the face of a possible case, the first step established in the agreement focuses on informing the affected person of the resources available to them, collects a note from the Executive.
If it is an owner who is facing non-payment of the mortgage, the protocol contemplates informing the affected people of the Code of Good Banking Practices, in case they can face the debt and not reach the launch.
In the case of eviction of tenants for non-payment of rent, the courts will report on the different programs offered by both the Government of the Canary Islands and the municipalities for social assistance.
PRO-HOME CANARY ISLANDS PROGRAM
The second step established by this protocol focuses on the eviction process, because if it is going to be carried out and it is detected that they are people in a vulnerable situation, the courts agree to stop the procedure and notify the ICAVI so that it can activate the Canarias Pro-Hogar program and verify the risk situation of those affected.
Once said vulnerability is certified, the affected people are included in the Canarias Pro Hogar, where they can be provided with help to pay the rent and avoid the release, or they will be referred to the municipal resources that are available and that offer the municipalities, as temporary housing.
Another way that is established to avoid eviction is to negotiate directly with investment funds or banking entities that own the property, as ICAVI currently does through Canarias Pro Hogar.
Unlike Royal Decree-Law 11/2020, which currently keeps eviction cases paralyzed in situations of vulnerability caused by the Covid-19 health crisis or derived from the war in Ukraine, the agreement will allow the paralysis to be applied of evictions to all cases of vulnerability in the Canary Islands, thus guaranteeing the necessary attention and avoiding the risk of the affected people falling into a situation of social exclusion.
IT WILL COVER ANY JUDICIAL PROCEEDING
In addition, this agreement will not focus on the large holders, but will cover any legal eviction proceedings on the islands.
“I think that the Canary Islands have come a long way in recent years in terms of housing and defending the rights of the most vulnerable, managing to avoid more than 1,300 evictions in the last three years. For this reason, what this agreement does is confirm what Until now, it has been done more or less voluntarily, between the different public administrations to do it through a protocol and through official channels,” Franquis pointed out.
For this reason, he thanked the municipalities, through the Fecam, and also the Council of the Judiciary, for signing this agreement and this protocol so that in the next four years “canary families with difficulties are much more protected than they were until the present day”.
Tools such as the Canarias ProHogar have allowed, since 2021 and to date, to stop 1,378 evictions in the archipelago, so this agreement will allow the promotion of this type of instrument in a joint and coordinated manner between administrations, said the acting counselor.
