The rejection in the Congress of Deputies of the royal decree-laws on housing has caused a political shock of the first order, but its most intense repercussions are not being felt in parliamentary offices, but in squares and streets.
The decision of the Courts not only abruptly interrupts the forced extensions of contracts and the shields against evictions that temporarily came into force, but also activates a scenario of profound social agitation.
The key question circulating the country, and very urgently the islands, is no longer just legislative: what will the people who maintain the encampments for the right to housing do now?
The rejection of the decrees has acted as a catalyst for social organizations. What began as a symbolic occupation of emblematic public spaces (emulating the spirit of historical mobilizations) has entered a phase of open resistance. The disappointment and tension accumulated after the parliamentary vote have led the collectives of the encampments in the Canary Islands to double down. Far from dismantling the tents, the protesters have announced new mobilizations and are already preparing to call for a general strike for housing.
The protest no longer seeks to pressure for a modification of a legal text. It now pursues a wholesale amendment of the economic and housing model.
If discontent is widespread, in ecosystems as fragile as Lanzarote's, the situation threatens to overflow. The island suffers from an endemic shortage of land, aggravated by the very strong profitability of holiday rentals and the pressure of mass tourism, which has reduced the residential market to historic lows.
Given the absolute lack of affordable alternatives and the end of the legal shields provided by the decree, the specter of residential exclusion is an imminent reality. For many citizens, the protests constitute the only visible trench to avoid being expelled from their own municipalities or to make visible that even essential workers can no longer find a roof over their heads.
This resurgence of social pressure places city councils and island councils before a technical and political dilemma of extreme delicacy. While social groups appeal to the constitutional right to assembly and demonstration to legitimize their stable encampments, administrations face pressure from commercial and real estate sectors, which demand compliance with local ordinances on public space occupation.
Local governments find themselves trapped between the need to maintain urban order and the political cost that forcibly evicting settlements born precisely from desperation over the housing crisis would entail.
The outcome in Congress demonstrates that unilateral solutions have not served to calm the waters. By rejecting the decree without offering a consensual and immediate alternative, institutions have transferred the conflict directly to the public sphere. While the real estate sector insists that the withdrawal of the regulation provides legal certainty to reactivate supply, the reality is that the social fracture continues to widen.
Without a state pact capable of coordinating public construction, offering stable incentives to property owners, and urgently addressing the asymmetries of island territories, the squares will remain full and the conflict, instead of diluting, will continue to escalate.
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