The president of the Government of the Canary Islands, Fernando Clavijo, defended this Tuesday a modification in the Courts of the Law of Bases of the Local Regime to allow the city councils to have more mechanisms to regulate the housing market, including the possibility of expropriating empty homes.
In a response in the plenary session of Parliament to the CC deputy David Toledo, the president pointed out that he has already discussed this issue with the Canary Islands Federation of Municipalities (Fecam) and with the Canary Islands Federation of Islands (Fecai) and the idea is to agree on a text with the Spanish Federation of Municipalities to present it to the Congress of Deputies.
The proposal includes that the city councils can apply "fiscal or census measures, even with penalties or expropriations of empty homes of more than six months, to guarantee access to housing", Clavijo explained.
He recalled that the Canary Islands has proposed that, due to its outermost condition, it may have a law of residence and limitation of housing purchases by foreigners.
"At first they called us crazy, but the reality is that the Government of Spain has assumed in its RUP strategy the postulates defended by the Canary Islands," Clavijo said.
Regarding giving more powers to the city councils, the president has pointed out that there are precedents in Berlin, Hamburg or Amsterdam and in countries of the European Union where the city councils have powers to regulate the housing market.