Soaring cost of housing in EU likened to threat of 'new pandemic'

‘The soaring cost of housing is akin to a “new pandemic” sweeping across Europe, the mayor of Barcelona said yesterday as he and 16 other city leaders urged the EU to respond to the crisis by providing billions in funding for the hardest-hit areas.

- Ashifa Kassam

The EU is expected to present its first housing plan today after consultations with experts, the public and other stakeholders. For months, those on the frontlines of the crisis have warned it is too large to ignore.

“The new pandemic affecting European cities is called the cost of housing,” said Jaume Collboni, who launched the Mayors for Housing alliance last year with the support of his counterparts in Paris and Rome.

“and in the face of this new pandemic, European institutions - as they did with Covid - must allocate extraordinary funds to promote the construction of affordable housing for young people, working families and the urban middle classes.”

For the past year, the alliance - whose 17 mayors represent more than 20 million people - has been calling on the EU to do more to address what it describes as a social emergency: the rocketing cost of property and rent.