Special committee on the Housing Crisis in the European Union Ordinary meeting
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HOUS European Parliament
Follow its sittingsMatthew Baldwin
I'm sorry, I spoke too quickly. I see smoke coming out of the booths. I'm very sorry, friends in the interpretation side. Um, and one last thought. The need for households to be empowered to produce their own renewable energy.
We are seeing more and more the potential for this and therefore we intend to encourage energy communities with practical tools to tackle existing administrative, technical and financial barriers in an energy communities action plan. And that's the speed I should have been speaking throughout, Madam Chair, and I apologize. Thank you very much for your attention.
Irene Tinagli
It's okay. Thank you. Thank you very, very much. Now I invite our guest speakers to present their work, each for eight minutes. And please, you know, be aware that we have excellent translators that are doing their best, but, you know, they need the time to do their job.
When you see the light flashing, it means that you are going too fast. So take a look from time to time and you should slow down, but I will also do this sometimes if I see that it's too fast. We start with José Manuel González Martí, associate professor of architectural constructions, and Sara González Moreno, PhD, University of Burgos. They will do the joint presentation.
Sara González Moreno
Madam Chair, honorable members, thank you very much for the invitation to take part of House Committee. We come from the University of Burgos and CEDEC, Center of Scalability in Efficient Building and Construction Development, with a very clear idea. Affordable housing no longer depends only on rent or purchase price. A home is not affordable if a family cannot heat it. It's not affordable if it takes years to build, if it consumes too much energy, or if every international crisis turns the energy bill into a threat.
That is why the title of our intervention is also our thesis. We need to move from public policy to measurable execution. Europe has directives, funds and ambition. What is often missing is the territorial capacity to translate all of that into real, efficient and replicable homes. CEDEC was created precisely to fill that gap.
From the European framework to the building constructed, measured and scaled. Next slide, please. Our starting point is different from that of other centers. We don't speak only as a research or as a university. We also speak from the construction site with more than 1,000 social homes delivered, also from the materials and industry side, as José Manuel was the founder and CEO of Areniscas, a sandstone company, and also from renewables or energy's point of view with more than 15 years in building projects.
We have lived the real challenges of building housing. Rising costs, extended deadlines, labor workforce deficit, execution mistakes, difficulty innovating and reluctance to adopt new solutions. At the same time, through GITECA, which is part is the research group inside of CEDEC and the University of Burgos, we have developed research, European projects, demonstrators and monitoring system. The value of CEDEC lies in that combination. Real construction plus scientific evidence.
José Manuel González Martín
We don't aim to produce reports. We aim to produce solutions that can be tendered, built, measured and repeated. We are ready to work. Burgos, located on the north of Spain with a cold climate, is the right scale, a mid-size city representative of many others in Europe. What works here can be replicated quickly and should be replicated quickly.
Next slide please. Tres grandes problemas, tres grandes retos para la vivienda asequible. Uno es la escasez de vivienda. Dos es el parque edificatorio envejecido que tenemos. Y tercero, nuevas técnicas que puedan abordar el realizar viviendas más rápido y más deprisa, la famosa industrialización que luego veremos más adelante.
CEDEC actúa donde la política pública necesita ejecución medible. Al primer problema, vamos a replicarlo con un estudio que se va a hacer en Burgos, que se está haciendo ya, que es el caso universitario. Burgos es una ciudad de 200.000 habitantes aproximadamente, el 5% de la población es universitaria, es una ciudad tremendamente industrial y tenemos una población aproximadamente de entre 9.000 y 10.000 estudiantes. De estos, el 63% son de fuera, por lo tanto viven en pisos, viven en viviendas que tendrían que estar destinadas a la población, a las familias. Sin embargo, su forma más asequible de poder vivir es ahí porque nada más tenemos 400 plazas residenciales para universitarios.
Entonces lo que ha decidido nuestra universidad es arrancamos con hacer 1.000 alojamientos universitarios. ¿Cómo? Mediante la colaboración público-privada. La universidad pone suelo, la administración pone financiación y posibilidades de tiempo y la privada, las empresas, las compañías dedicarán a construir y a rentabilizar esto en 40, 50 años. ¿Qué conseguimos?
Conseguimos que el reto sea que la población estudiantil no no tenga no trabaje no no sea una una situación posible para la la ciudadanía. Entonces necesitamos un problema que es la energía, como ha dicho el presidente. ¿Qué pasa con la energía? Cuando ha habido la guerra de Ucrania o la guerra de Irán ha subido. ¿Quién tiene que pagar esos costos?
No tiene que ser el ciudadano. ¿Cómo se soluciona? Con vivienda eficiente, con medidas pasivas, medidas que no nos cuesten, medidas cercanas al estándar Passivhaus que creo que es un estándar que todos conocemos y que funciona francamente bien. El segundo reto es el parque edificatorio que tenemos, que es envejecido. Tenemos viviendas construidas en Burgos de antes del año 2006, antes de que existiera un código técnico, una especie de ley global que regula la construcción tanto técnica como eficientemente en nuestra nuestro país.
¿Qué tenemos que hacer? Priorizar qué tipo de viviendas para las familias más vulnerables, rehabilitar de forma sostenible, con altas prestaciones térmicas y sobre todo con sistemas eficientes que podamos monitorizar y que nos sigan aportando datos. ¿Qué aporta CEDEC? Nuestros 14 años de experiencia en proyectos europeos y la profusión de datos que tenemos a ese respecto. Por último, la último problema es cómo hacer más viviendas y más rápido.
La palabra mágica que parece que está en boga de todo el mundo, la industrialización. Está bien, sí, pero la industrialización está asumida o arreglada en cuanto a vivienda unifamiliar, a pequeñas alturas y sobre todo en madera. Cuando trabajamos en alturas grandes, en grandes bloques, la industrialización hoy por hoy está todavía iniciando. Ni siquiera en los países como pueda ser Francia, como pueda ser Inglaterra, están construyendo por encima del 40, 50% de este tipo de viviendas con solución global. Por lo tanto la industrialización podríamos pasar que en precios yo he construido en el 2006 a 600 euros metro cuadrado, en el 2020 a 100 a 1.000 euros metro cuadrado, actualmente estamos en 1.500 y si fuera industrialización industrialización en altura estaríamos por encima de los 2.000 euros.
Luego la industrialización necesita formación, necesita competitividad para que las materias la gente baje, esa formación sería fundamental.
¿Qué aporta CEDEC? Investigación, desarrollo, tenemos soluciones, tenemos un máster, un posgrado en el desde el punto de vista de la construcción, no desde el punto de vista de la arquitectura, sino industrializar quiere decir que haya menos puestos de trabajo, menos, por eso, menos hombres, más mujeres y sobre todo más formación. Bajaríamos un 25% los retos de energía en ejecución, bajaríamos un 50% el número de trabajadores y bajaríamos casi un 60% en la siniestralidad. CEDEC, la innovación dice que no se no genera, no puede ser. Entonces, ¿cuándo se puede hacer innovación?
Cuando hay lugares reales donde probarlos, cuando hay datos para convencer, cuando hay empresas capaces de ejecutar y cuando hay técnicos formados. Esa es la diferencia de CEDEC. No solo somos una universidad que investiga, no solo somos un centro que acompaña, somos una plataforma que combina experiencia profesional de construcción, evidencia científica, territorio disponible, demostradores reales y una vocación clara de replicar. Es decir, nuestro compromiso es sencillo: ayudar a construir la respuesta, medirla y hacerla replicable. Muchas gracias.
Irene Tinagli
Muchísimas gracias, muy interesante. Ahora I give the floor to Rémi Collombet, Secretary General, Efficient Buildings Europe.
Rémi Collombet
Madam Chair, honorable members, many thanks for for this invitation. My name is Rémi Collombet, I'm representing Efficient Buildings Europe. Next slide, please. We're the trade association representing the manufacturers of products and equipment that together make buildings more efficient. The wide range: insulation, windows, heat pumps, district heating, control systems, everything that you need.
So, next slide, please. My first point will be very much in line with the first presentation and it's basically saying that inefficient homes are liabilities for European citizens. Our buildings are consuming the vast majority of our energy in Europe, a large part of the fossil fuels that we consume, and a significant share of the EU population is in a situation of energy poverty. I also looked this morning and the share of people not able to keep their homes cold is is very, very high, around 40%. And as we've seen, energy prices have increased significantly over the past few years, with bumps due to the iron crisis very recently, especially on gas prices, and now the heatwave putting pressure on our electricity system.
Just on the right of the slide, you'll see an illustration just showing with an average example in the French EPC system that basically there's an order of magnitude of difference between what you would pay for an A-rated building compared to a G building. And any increase has a multiple impact in for inhabitants of G-class buildings. So basically the point is really that affordability is not only about the price of energy, but about how much a home needs to consume to deliver comfort. Emergency support is very much needed in some cases, but only renovations and the delivery of efficient buildings remove the exposure that we have to price increases and shocks. Next slide, please.
The good news is that solutions already exist in the EU. We all know the technologies that deliver, they're mature, they're available.
They're and another piece of information that's also really useful is that they work both to protect households from cold winters and warm summers. So it's really tackling, well, hitting one bird with two birds with one stone, sorry. And there's proven results. So energy efficiency works. We're able to reduce the consumption by 80% plus of dwellings and latest numbers by the European Commission show that this results in substantial savings in terms of the money spent on your heating bills.
It's also a very good industrial opportunity for Europe. We have 650 plus manufacturing sites for energy efficiency solutions in the EU, 6.5 million workers in the renovation supply chain. So a very local sector in the transition. Beyond the sort of micro perspective of the energy bill for a single building, there's multiple benefits to efficient homes and energy renovation. When everybody consumes less, wholesale energy prices come down.
It also saves money on investments avoided in terms of extra grid and extra generation capacity. Beyond that, it's also increasing housing supply. There's lots of reports on the number of vacant properties in Europe, around 45 million I believe, that a large part of them could be brought back to the market thanks to energy renovations. We've seen really good examples of schemes being put in place in Ireland and in Greece. And finally, health and well-being.
It's really a key aspect and co-benefit of energy efficiency where we're seeing improved health and increased productivity for people living and working in efficient buildings. It's also from the supply side a very strong driver for the demand. Money is not the only point that will convince people to renovate. Comfort and just feeling well in their in their homes is very much a driver next to this. So three short-term recommendations for Member States first.
The first one being that long-term predictability and visibility is really what's missing at the moment at the national level. We've seen a lot of changes in support programs. For example, in France, in my home country, there's been 15 reforms of the main renovation program, MaPrimeRénov', in five years. It's not really conducive to aligning all the stakeholders that you need to align to deliver on this objective. So really continuity, stability in support is absolutely needed there.
Second point is that we actually have a really good framework at the moment with the Energy Efficiency Directive, the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive, the ETS 2 and the Renewable Energy Directive. What we need now is really to see that being implemented at the national level. There's lots of elements beyond requirements to support citizens in renovating, reducing the administrative burden for them, facilitating access to financing. And to continue on financing, my third point would really be an encouragement to use the remaining EU funds and turn them into renovations. There's still some leftover money in the Recovery and Resilience Facility, in the Cohesion Funds, and we really encourage Member States to make the most of them to deliver renovations.
And my final points will be addressed to EU decision-makers where we see that during this mandate there's still a lot that can be done to unlock efficient buildings and energy renovation.
First, looking at private financing. National budgets are tightening at the moment and this is a cause of worry for for the sector, but we see that there's a lot that can be done in terms of unlocking private finance, bringing banks into the discussion. And there, the idea of the EU renovation loan, a standardized instrument at a low rate, would really benefit a lot of the population that doesn't have access to private money at at the moment, especially elderly people with higher risk profile, young people with no collateral that are off the market at the moment and could be brought in. Obviously, we encourage also a better use of public money, especially EU public money, encouraging blending through the upcoming multiannual financial framework. We see that as really a way to leverage the limited money we have to increase scale and delivery.
And finally, sending long-term signals is also key, especially from the industry side where all the investments that we're making are really based on a multiannual plan. So they're not made to 2030, they're made to 2035, 2040. And so making sure that there's energy efficiency objectives beyond 2030 is key to unlock the investment to make the products and equipment available in the years ahead. Many thanks.
Irene Tinagli
Thank you, thank you very much. Now I give the floor to Michael Gebauer, head of GBV, the umbrella organization of all non-profit housing companies in Austria.
Michael Gehbauer
Hello everybody, dear ladies and gentlemen, high representatives of the European Parliament. I speak about affordable housing in times of high energy costs. The Austrian limited profit housing model, keeping homes affordable while decarbonization. Next slide please. Affordability and decarbonization are not competing goals.
A limited profit cost-rent sector can renovate at scale and switch homes off fossil fuels without an energy price shock to tenants. One million affordable homes managed by our sector in Austria. 1.4 billion are invested in renovation in 2024 alone. And about 160 euros by average is the rent lower than in the private market in our homes. Next slide please.
We are a third sector between market and state. Private independent companies, not public, not for profit. Bound by a sector-specific law, the Limited Profit Housing Act, called WGG, to reinvest rather than maximize profit. The one million apartments we administrate are two-thirds rental, one-third owner-occupied. 173 limited non-profit housing associations are in our federation.
88 cooperatives and 85 companies. 29% of all new housing built in Austria and 53 of all apartments are built by our sector. 3.2 billion are invested in new construction in 2024. What makes it work? Non-speculative ownership, permanent tenancies, cost-based rents, surpluses reinvested into new homes and renovation.
Rents follow actual costs, not market prices. Three rules do the work. First, cost rents. Rent covers construction, financing, and upkeep. Limited profit margins.
Next slide please. Affordability is engineered, not left to the market.
Roughly 6 euros per square meter net are typical in Vienna schemes. Reinvestment via revolving funds. Surpluses, limited profit margin, after loans are repaid, stay in the sector as equity for the next homes, not paid out to shareholders. Reinvestment of equity, revolving funds. Three, security of tenure.
Permanent, unlimited tenancies. Homes are protected against speculation by law, even when they're sold. The result: once loans are repaid, rents fall, and the home stays affordable for the next generation of tenants. Next slide, please. The affordability dividend for tenants and the state.
As I said, 160 euros per month is the lower rent on average than a comparable private market home for the individuals. 1.2 billion per year saved by Austrian households across the sector every year. Beyond the individual rent, it cools the whole market. A 10-point rise in the limited profit market share lowers private rents by 30 to 40 cents per square meter in the private sector. It stabilizes the economy.
The Central Bank finds the sector highly resilient, strong capital, near-zero bad loans, a buffer for the financial system. It lowers public expenditures on housing allowances. Better affordability reduces the need to support tenants via direct payment, via housing allowances. Next slide, please. The energy costs is the second rent.
When heating and electricity bills spike, a household's housing cost rises even if the rent never moves. For low and middle-income tenants, the energy bill, not the rent, is now where affordability is won or lost. Energy poverty is a housing problem. It is decided in the building, its walls, windows, and the heating system. Renovation cuts the bill at source.
A deep retrofit lowers running costs permanently, the only durable hedge against volatile prices. And it's also supply. Upgrading existing homes protects the affordable stock we already have. Next slide. What we have to decarbonize: how limited profit rental homes are heated today in Austria.
56% are heated by district heating, 33 by fossil fuels, mainly gas, 7% renewables, and 4 with electric energy. The task: around one in three rental homes still burns fossil fuel. Each one a household exposed to gas price shocks and a target to retrofit. Next slide, please. Renovation at scale, record year.
In 2024, the sector renovated more than ever before and accelerated the switch of fossil heating. 1.4 billion euros invested in renovation in 2024, the highest figure on record. 6,800 homes given a deep thermal retrofit in a single year, and 6,600 homes switched from fossil heating to a climate-friendly system. Each fossil boiler replaced and each facade insulated takes a household permanently out of the energy price firing line. How we renovate without a rent shock: a dedicated maintenance and improvement fund, EVB.
Tenants pay a small regulated monthly amount that the association sets aside specially for upkeep and energy upgrades.
It is pooled in advance. Regulated EVB contribution builds a fund over time. Because the money is pooled in advance and the model is limited profit, a deep retrofit doesn't arrive as a sudden unaffordable rent jump. But also public support is added. Low-interest loans and grants open to all providers should be given.
It is more equitable as the cost of renovation is spread across the life cycle of a building. Bill falls, rent stays stable. Lower energy costs, no speculative markup is made. Four conditions to scale the model. One, treat affordable housing as infrastructure.
Stable long-term public finance, not stop-go funding that breaks the investment cycle. Two, keep support open to all providers. Low-interest loans and renovation grants should reach any non-profit builder whatever its legal form. Three, de-risk decarbonization finance. EU instruments to lower the cost of capital for deep retrofits.
Rising rates must not stall renovation. And four, put the social safeguard in every retrofit. Renovation must lower tenants' total housing costs, guard against displacement and energy poverty. At least three messages for the committee. Affordability and climate go together.
A non-profit, a limited profit sector, cost-rent sector decarbonizes while protecting tenants. The two goals reinforce each other. And renovation is the durable answer of energy costs. Deep retrofits cut the bill at source and safeguard the affordable stock we already have. And Europe sets the conditions.
Infrastructure-grade finance, support open to all non-profit providers and social safeguard every retrofit. Thank you. I look forward to your questions.
Irene Tinagli
Thank you, very interesting. And now I give the floor to Barbara Steenbergen, member of the executive committee, International Union of the Tenants.
Barbara Steenbergen
Thank you very much, Mrs. Chair, a pleasure to be here. Also a welcome to the members of the European Parliament, to the Commission. I think it's very important that we talk about the interface between energy policy and rent law. And I'm here on behalf of the International Union of Tenants, representing 82 tenants' organizations in the world. We are present nearly everywhere and I'm representing the European office here.
Next slide, please. So, what I want to show in our presentation from the International Union of Tenants is that we need to empower the tenants in the energy transition. But this is actually a challenge. We do know that rising housing and energy costs are coming together and they add on an increasing pressure on low and middle-income households. So my presentation will focus on the structural drivers of housing and energy poverty, the high energy costs and how they undermine housing affordability with immediate effects on social equity, so on the entire society as well as the economic development of a country.
I will give you an update on the split incentive problem. Split incentive is a term which we use here very much, a technological term at the EU level. But I will give you the split incentive problem from the tenants' perspective.
And last but not least, I want to give you some possible solutions to overcome the problem. Next slide, please. Why we, the tenants, the consumers of the market, shouldn't be left behind. I can tell you the risk. We are many.
One third of the Europeans, so in total 150 million people, are renting their apartments. They are tenants. 34 million Europeans face energy poverty. And especially this is concentrated on tenants in poor quality housing, on older people, on single parents. In general, low-income households are disproportionately affected and there is a clear gender aspect in housing and energy poverty.
Women are even more disadvantaged. Gender pay gap, gender pension gap. The inefficient buildings that we have now are leading to high energy costs, but this is not the only thing. We have health problems caused by that. And we have increasing housing cost overburden and therefore a loss of purchasing power.
We do have a progress which is uneven in EU countries because we have differences in funding capacity and also the quality of our housing stock. So without legal social protection safeguards, the energy transition risks driving rent increases and pricing out low and middle-income households from the market. So what we should do actually, what is the goal that we have to do here? We are here in the committee for the housing crisis, so we have to find a solution on that. So I think we can only do this together, securing affordability, cutting the costs and strengthening the social equity.
So actually, I think the overarching goal must be that everybody should have equal access to energy-efficient housing and that should be a priority for all, regardless of income and tenure. So this is our offer to those who rent out, the landlords. I think to ensure a fair energy transition, we need a range of political and financial solutions that are needed as well to protect tenants, but also to support and encourage landlords' investment in renovation and make sure that those benefits are shared equally. So we are not fighting against, we have to do this together. Next slide, please.
This is now very important, ladies and gentlemen, it's a little bit technical, but I have to guide you through this because this is now the interface between energy policy and rent law. What we call in general here the split incentive, as it is defined here, is that the landlord bears the cost of investment and the tenant enjoys the benefits. But this is actually not the full reality. When you take a look at the rent law, we have 21 European states where the costs for renovation can be immediately passed on to the tenants. And this applies in particular to the private rental sector.
This is the normal situation where the majority of the 150 million tenants in Europe live. This problem that the costs of renovation are passed on immediately to the tenants is a social time bomb.
And it requires special legislative and financial efforts to avoid displacement and renovictions, evictions by renovation. There are some solutions, but actually only a few countries use rent stabilization mechanisms, for instance like rent caps on the maximum rent amount that the landlord may ask after renovation. But this is not the normality, this is the small exemption. There is also another interesting aspect of that. If there are public subsidies for energy renovations, usually these amount of the public subsidy has to be deducted from the rent increase coming after renovation.
This makes sense because we are talking here also about increasing public funds and subsidies. This is a solution. The problem is at the end many tenants don't even know if public subsidies have been used because there is a lack of disclosure obligations on that. So what can we actually do? I promised you to give you also a solution on that.
The solution is the wonderful technical term housing cost neutrality. What does that actually mean? It means that the rent increases after renovation, as I told you, they are possible in 21 European member states and they are done, the rent increases in the private rental sector. Not everybody, ladies and gentlemen, has the luck to live in social housing. Actually only 3% of the population of Europe lives in social housing and the rest is in the private rental sector.
That means that the rent increases after renovation should be balanced by at least equal energy savings at the same amount. This is the balance of the housing cost neutrality. These tools, also as rent caps after renovation and targeted subsidies, help to protect tenants and are robust social safeguards. This is not utopia. There are best practices in the European Responsible Housing Initiative.
And I would like you to join the next call for applications for the European Responsible Housing Awards. My neighbor here was the one two years ago who won the prize. And Monsieur Bortman from the European Commission, I was very pleased that you moderated the session of the best responsible European housing projects. So the key takeaways, ladies and gentlemen. We need, I think everybody told it here, we need increased targeted EU funding for energy efficient renovations, but we need clear conditionalities.
We must prioritize the low and middle income households. We must implement mandatory housing cost neutrality. We must implement rent stabilization mechanisms. And if funding is used, public funding, whether it comes from the EU, from the national or from the local level, there needs to be a disclosure that this has been used because then the rent cannot be increased. I think these are our key components from the tenants for the new EU Affordable Housing Act, hard legislation to come next year.
Thank you very much.
Irene Tinagli
Thank you. And now I give the floor to Julije Domac, managing director at REGEA, the Northwest Croatia Regional Energy Agency, who is joining us remotely. Welcome, thank you for accepting our invitation.
Julije Domac
Thank you for the invitation. Madam Chair, members of the European Parliament, dear colleagues, I will be speaking from hot city of Zagreb today. I will be speaking on behalf of cities and energy agencies. It's always a challenge to speak the last one. There is a danger to repeat many things.
But I really enjoyed the presentations from colleagues and I will try to give some ideas and some contributions and at the same time not to repeat many things which in principle I agree which were proposed by colleagues before. Obviously, I think we all agree that housing affordability is not only a housing issue. Housing become one of the issues defining energy, social and security questions of Europe. Here in Zagreb, well, other cities in Croatia, well, I'm sure other cities of Europe, citizens do not experience Europe through directives, regulations or strategies, with all due respect, of course. They experience Europe through their housing cost, through their energy bills, well, inflation and all bills in general, of course, and through their quality of life.
This is why we must stop treating housing affordability and energy poverty as separate challenges. That's the same challenge, I believe. Energy poverty is not temporary, it's structural. It's driven by inefficient buildings, fossil fuel dependency and insufficient local delivery capacity. We really live now in Europe in strange times.
We face dangerous paradox. We want climate neutrality at one point, we want affordable housing, we want energy sovereignty and yet millions of Europeans still live in buildings that waste energy every day. This is why renovation matters. Renovation is not only a climate measure, it's fairness measure. It permanently reduce bills, improves health, strengthens energy security and so on and so on.
At the end, the renovation only works if citizens can actually access it. Citizens, I don't think citizens need more grants. They need other things. They need guidance, they need trust, they need someone who can help them move from idea to implementation. And this is precisely the role for cities with their energy agencies, the role for cities with their one-stop shops across Europe.
That brings me to my first request and message to the committee. Please give local and regional actors a formal role in delivering the Social Climate Fund and the affordable housing plan. Today, too much of the discussion focuses on funding and not enough on delivery. The question is not only how much money we can allocate. The question is who helps citizens access it.
There are already players. There are, as I said, cities with one-stop shops, municipalities with their energy agencies.
They should not be consulted after decisions are made. They should be a part of the implementation architecture from the beginning. So the request to summarize is make local delivery structures eligible partners and direct beneficiaries of implementation programs. Second request concerns renovation. We spend hundreds of billions of euros protecting citizens from high energy prices.
Sometimes support is necessary, but subsidies protect people only temporarily. Renovation protect them permanently. When you summarize how much money was spent on fossil energy all around Europe, it's actually incredible how much could be possible to deliver and how much renovation, how much batteries, how much solar roofs could be delivered. And investments means lower bills every year, greater comfort, better health and lower exposure of course to all future energy crises. And I think it's quite obvious they will come.
The second request therefore is prioritize deep renovation programs for low and middle income households and make support simple, accessible and locally delivered. The cheapest energy is still the energy we do not need. There is one more point I would like to emphasize. Too often when Europe faces a challenge, our first instinct is to create a new framework, something new. New platform, new reporting system, new new something.
But when it comes to housing affordability and energy poverty, Europe already has much of it what it needs. The Covenant of Mayors community has spent years building local climate and energy plans, data systems, implementation frameworks and citizen engagement mechanisms. Together with the European Energy Poverty Advisory Hub and the Joint Research Centre, we developed indicators, we have data, we have socioeconomic conditions and cities and regions across Europe are already using that tools. Local and regional energy agencies are already helping citizens navigate transition. So this is why I really wanted to emphasize that.
The third message today is not only about funding, it's about coherence. We should build on what already exists. Social climate plans should be aligned with SECAPs, affordable housing initiatives should be aligned with local climate and energy strategies. My third request therefore is very concrete. Align the affordable housing agenda and the Social Climate Fund with existing Covenant of Mayors framework.
Use SECAPs and local climate plans to identify priorities, target investments and monitor impact. Please avoid creating new layers of planning and new reporting requests where effective structures already exist. Every euro spent on administration is euro not spent on citizens, euro not spent on investments. We must move from energy poverty to energy empowerment. Citizens should not only receive support, they should become active participants in Europe energy future.
And I can only repeat what colleagues said before about energy communities and European energy community facility where REGEA and FEDARENE are participating proved already that with just few millions of euros of support, we are able to mobilize tens of millions of euros of local investments. We need this at scale. At the end, housing affordability, lower energy bills, and European energy sovereignty are not separate challenges. They are part of the same solution. If we want affordable housing in Europe, we must renovate homes, reduce energy demand, accelerate clean heating, and empower citizens where they actually live.
And this means trusting the actors already doing the work. And I'm really happy that we have some really concrete examples of the work cities, regions, and energy agencies are doing already. At the end, ladies and gentlemen, Europe succeeds or fails locally. Thank you very much for your attention.
Irene Tinagli
Thank you. So now we can move on to the Q&A sessions and the interventions of our representatives of the political group. And I start by giving the floor to Andreas Schieder for the S&D.
Andreas Schieder
Good afternoon and thank you, Madam President, and thanks also to all the speakers for this interesting afternoon. I think it's an important issue. And as we are usually discussing rising housing costs, rental costs, and purchasing costs, I think we have to be aware that energy cost is even putting more drama into the problems. And on the other side, neither house owners or even stronger tenants possibly can escape these problems, not technically, not economically, and also not bureaucratically. So I think this is important what we have to be aware.
Second remark, in the past when we spoke about energy, we usually were thinking about heating. Now I think it's also about cooling, isolation, making shadow, and this kind of issues. And even this makes it more complicated for tenants to move on on this. So having said so, we cannot, I think, put this energy efficiency not up to the private households themselves alone. Secondly, I think we need new construction rules in order to maximize efficiency, energy efficiency, and isolation.
And also construction itself plays a major role. So I think also circular economy and raw materials is one issue which is in this basket and also the question what kind of materials we are using. But having said so, I think we have heard some models and I think I would be more interested in details because as far as I understand, when you ask the tenant that he should, he or she should do the investment, they would say, sorry, but it's not my apartment, why should I and how could I because I'm not allowed to do anything. If you ask the owner, the renter, they would say, but I'm not living there, so why should I invest? So I think this is the perfect business case where public money can be the kickoff to bring together the benefit of all three, which is a public benefit of lower, let's say, climate impact, of higher value for the apartment, which is the private owner's interest, and of course of lower energy costs.
And I think it is important then also having a mechanism which is these benefits distributing fairly to everybody, so that it's not on one side but to everybody. And this I think is a classical public one and probably we have to fight also to have sentences in the upcoming MFF in order to allow also to have these kickoff investments.
Irene Tinagli
Thank you. Thank you very much. Now I take another question and then I go back to the experts and I give the floor to Ciaran Mullooly for Renew.
Ciaran Mullooly
Thank you Chair. Colleagues as we sit here today in the middle of a record breaking heatwave it's easy to forget that only months ago many people were struggling to heat their homes. Today they struggle to cool them as my colleague just inferred a few moments ago. In Ireland ESRI data published in April shows that in 2024 around 14% of households could not afford to properly heat their homes or pay their energy bills in full. With just over one in 10 households in 2015 spending more than 10% of their disposable income on energy and over 30% of households experiencing some form of energy affordability challenge the depth of the problem is indeed clear.
And this is before the latest energy shock with the closure of the Strait of Hormuz pushing prices to some of their highest levels in years. So what has been the response? Well unfortunately too often one-off measures that underestimate the scale of the problem without a structured long-term plan are put forward. Income supports like a fuel allowance do play an important part but because they are means tested many households just above the threshold face a cliff edge with little or no support. Colleagues we cannot control international energy markets but we can control how we respond.
First while progress has been made on retrofitting I believe we must target these investments better so that they reach the households that need them most. That is how we deliver permanent reductions in energy bills. Second I believe we must remove barriers that constrain housing supply and drive up costs including planning and state aid constraints that discourage investment. And third I believe we must fix gaps in income supports by replacing these cliff edges with more gradual tapered systems. I believe we cannot separate energy policy from housing policy if our goal is indeed affordability.
We need joined up thinking that combines retrofits increased supply and smarter supports to protect households from both cold winters and high bills. Our last speaker I believe also hit the nail on the head when he appealed to us to ensure that our local authorities our local agencies our local regional regional authorities are involved in this process. I 100% also support him that we should look towards renovation as a priority. I've said this many times at this committee. And indeed that we should build on what we have in terms of our existing local climate plans.
There are people listening to us here today who are in arrears with their electricity bill and they're asking us to dig deep to support them. One thing I've found in this committee is that it is a complicated a complicated task to try and reduce energy bills particularly in Ireland with the highest electricity bills in Europe. But I believe our measures as supported by our own report are a step in the right direction. We must at the end of the day try and cut through the red tape and assist our citizens. Thank you.
Thank you very much. So who wants to take the floor first?
José Manuel González Martín
Hola, buenas tardes. Bueno, técnicamente las medidas están resueltas ya hace mucho tiempo que está resuelto. Y esa factura que estamos pagando en los hogares, sobre todo más desprotegidos, es una factura que se arregla con lo que hemos empezado desde nuestra universidad viendo, ¿no?, medidas pasivas. No es tan difícil ni es tan caro ni es tan costoso que la renovaciones, lo que llamáis renovaciones en inglés, las rehabilitaciones de las viviendas, de las fachadas, se hagan de forma con medidas pasivas. Eso hace que el coste energético sea escasísimo luego.
Luego es una única inversión tanto para las viviendas que ya tenemos, normalmente las más precarias, las más pobres son las que más dificultades tienen, como para las nuevas. Las nuevas también. Pero yo creo que tenemos un problema y es llegar al acceso a todas las pequeñas poblaciones. Es decir, si desde la Unión Europea no se tienen pliegos generales que de alguna manera obliguen a lo que luego las corporaciones locales pequeñas no pueden tener por sí mismos, será complicado que esto se solucione. Pero insisto, técnicamente es muy fácil.
Y económicamente no es tan gravoso. Es más gravoso el problema de tener viviendas poco eficaces, poco estancas, poco impermeables y que hagan que tengamos una ventilación por dentro, como nos ha dicho nuestro compañero en Francia de los fabricantes de ventilación, que permitan que esto funcione. No es tan difícil.
Barbara Steenbergen
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yes, I want to come back to both of the very important points, also from Andreas Schieder and Ciarán Cuffe. First of all, coming to the first point of Mr. Schieder. Yes, public money is needed. As I told you, as a matter of fact, investments in energy efficiency are passed on to the tenants unless public money is used.
This is very important to know. This is the rent law in every European country. If we find a funding conditionality in our next MFF, and actually I would say it should be one integral part of the new EU competitiveness fund, because this is competitiveness, the affordability of housing and energy. Then we should make a binding condition that if public money is used, and I'm very sure that there will be funding because the European Union has funded energy efficiency, but not as targeted as we wanted it. It was not targeted enough to the low and middle income households, and this is what all my fellow experts said.
So there we must find a better clue, a better target, and include this funding conditionality, public funding, but then also disclose that there is public funding, because then the rent cannot be increased. I think this is very important. Coming to the point of Mr. Cuffe. You hit the nail on the head. The energy cost problem is coming on top of the housing cost problem.
We do know that now the majority of the people living in the capitals of Europe or the booming centers pay more than 50% of their disposable income just for the rent. And the rent is the cold rent. We call it cold rent without energy costs. So the energy costs are coming on top.
So we are reaching now levels of 60% of disposable income for housing and energy. Top of this are for instance is the city of Lisbon where the inhabitants pay 105%, so more than they actually have, for housing and energy cooling. So this is crazy. So this is a massive economic shock effect that we have. This has impact on the functioning of the European Union.
This is not only social, this is economy. So I think it is out of question that we have to do something whether it is in the MFF, in the competitiveness funds or whatever we find now for our next budget. But please keep in mind it has to be more targeted to the rental residential sector, especially the private rental sector where we have this massive rent hikes through energy renovation, renovictions also. It has to be targeted for that and we have to concentrate on the low and middle income households. Thank you.
Irene Tinagli
Thank you very much. If there are no other requests from our speakers to respond to the first two questions, I will move on to the next MEP, Gordan Bosanac for the Greens.
Gordan Bosanac
Thank you chair and thanks to all the speakers for very interesting presentations. And I'm actually happy to hear that there is like consensus I would say within all the speakers about the necessity of continuing of the energy efficiency and you know that affordability should not be undermined because of needed investment in energy and green energy transition and energy efficient houses and energy reconstructions. So this is the good news because sometimes we hear some other voices in this house who are saying that you know actually we should give up from energy efficiency because it's too expensive and we should focus just to provide homes as soon as possible not questioning the quality but the quantity of the homes. But I'm happy that this kind of discourse is not here. But what I'm hearing also the problem which everyone is opening, it's the just transition and how much actually then we are are we fair in this transition to everyone.
And for me it was interesting to hear also from Zagreb experience but also from Spanish experience the the position of very local level of who is actually cities and regions who are implementing EU policies. And it was mentioned for both of you that money is not the crucial problem but there are some other problems you've been mentioning. But can you maybe elaborate a little bit more what do you see as the biggest obstacles really to implement all the EU policies we are designing here and then when it comes to you in your towns where the problems are there, where they stuck actually?
Alicia Homs Ginel
Sí, muchas gracias, presidenta. Bueno, creo que no es casualidad hoy que los que niegan el cambio climático y sus socios que están dispuestos a bajar, ¿no?, todas las expectativas que la pasada legislatura conseguimos poner sobre la mesa para atajar la cuestión, ¿no?, en este caso de la eficiencia energética, de los costes de la energía, pues que no estén hoy en esta comisión. Pero bueno, yo creo que está claro, ¿no?, que quien vive en una vivienda que es menos eficiente energéticamente no lo hace porque quiere, sino que lo hace por una cuestión de renta. Y esto significa que al final los hogares más vulnerables son los que pagan las facturas más altas.
Pero hay una pregunta que sí me hago porque no tengo claro hasta qué punto lo estamos haciendo bien. Y es que cuando se invierte en una rehabilitación, cuando se mejora la eficiencia energética de una casa o de un edificio, y todo esto hace que suba el valor de esta casa o de este edificio, la pregunta ya no es solo técnica, sino también política. ¿Quién captura ese valor añadido? ¿Lo hacen los inquilinos en forma de facturas más bajas y estabilidad o lo trasladamos a rentas más altas y a que haya más rotación residencial? ¿Cómo valoráis los expertos esa protección de los inquilinos en el proceso de transformación de la vivienda?
Porque si no nos planteamos estas preguntas, lo que hacemos al final es correr el riesgo de que la transición energética no se democratice, que sea solo para unos pocos. Y además también va a suponer una nueva fase de la crisis energética de vivienda, perdón, en la que quienes más lo necesitan al final no ven los beneficios de las políticas que nosotros hacemos con toda nuestra buena intención, pero que se acaban beneficiando pues los que más tienen al final. Gracias.
Irene Tinagli
Thank you very much. So now I give back the floor to our experts. Who wants to start?
José Manuel González Martín
Yo voy a contestar por alusiones, ¿no? ¿Que qué medios podríamos tener? Pues desde la Unión Europea debemos tener una legislación genérica que permita que esos pliegos generales lleguen a las administraciones pequeñas. Hay muchas administraciones pequeñas que no tienen medios ni técnicos suficientes como para poder realizar este tipo, ahora mismo hay un montón de posibilidades para rehabilitar viviendas. Pero eso necesita que las administraciones lo pongan al servicio del ciudadano.
Para eso tiene que ser administraciones que puedan. Y hay administraciones a partir de ciertos niveles de población que no se llega. Curiosamente las más pequeñas, curiosamente las más problemáticas. Una de dos, o desde la Unión Europea se toman cartas en el asunto y se hace un pliego genérico, que supongo que será harto difícil, pero tiene que ser posible que haga que las pequeñas administraciones tengan esa posibilidad desde nuestro punto de vista. Respondiendo a tu a la última compareciente, perdona, en España tenemos una ventaja y es que la mayor parte de la población es propietaria.
Con hipoteca, pero propietaria. Eso quiere decir que también a las viviendas pobres se les llega y se accede. Creo que es el primer paso para poder que eso acceda de como has dicho democráticamente, se democratice esa llegada de fondos. Si tenemos a los propietarios más vulnerables con posibilidades y se arregla su vivienda, irá haciendo poco a poco que como por efecto bumerán vaya volviendo a todos los inquilinos también los que no están en alquiler. Esa es mi opinión.
Gracias.
Barbara Steenbergen
Thank you. Thank you, Mrs. Chair. So first of all, answering the question of Mr. Buzananc, thank you for that, how can we come over this, these barriers that we always have? I really think that we need to think big. We are sometimes just thinking renovating single houses.
But I think the solution lies in district renovation. District renovation. If we set up there functioning energy systems, energy efficient systems, then we have also the business case. And we, I think this must be set up of course by the local communities. It is decided in the city councils when we say we will renovate this quarter, not one by one, but district, district, because this is I think also the most efficient when you make a energy system, an efficient energy system immediately for the district and not for every single house.
I really do believe that housing cost neutrality is the solution. So we must find ways to balance the rent increases after renovation by energy savings at the same amount. And this is not just a problem between landlords and tenants. This is a problem of the entire society. We cannot leave the most vulnerable and, ladies and gentlemen, if you are a tenant, you pay all over Europe a higher share of your disposable income for rent than when you are an owner, because home ownership is more funded, promoted at European level by tax incentives and and and, you all know this.
So the question is, I think, first things first, let's concentrate on the rental sector and let's implement the housing cost neutrality principle in all our funding conditions, whether European, national, regional or local level. And my esteemed neighbor, Mr. Gebauer, he showed us how it works. It is possible. Again, it's not utopia, by clever changes in the rent law and by public funding at the same time and using district renovation. Thank you.
Irene Tinagli
Yes. Mr. Gebauer and then I also have a request for the floor by Mr. Domac, who's connected.
Michael Gehbauer
As I told you, our sector is mostly in the rental part of the economy. So that means that it's quite easier for us to make the renovations. And we have this special strategy on our strategy on maintenance and improvement funds. So that means there is money which can be used for renovation. And it's very important that you don't have to pay the money at the moment when the investment is has to be taken.
You have to to to collect the money over long periods to have it when you really really need it. And it's also our aim till 2040 to to reach the decarbonization of our sector. It's very difficult, we don't really know if we will achieve this aim, but it's a real aim. And we also tried to nominate representatives of our companies who are responsible to divide the technical ideas and everything how to manage this problem. And so we also do from our federation some contributions to help the the companies to achieve the aim.
But the most important thing is that we have also in Austria a system where public, every every worker, every employee in Austria pays one percent of his wage for affordable housing. And so we have funds we can use for renovation. So it's also important that public investments can be used for this investment. And we also hope that from your side there will come some money we also can use for the renovation because it's a real enormous challenge for our sector to make it like I told you before.
Julije Domac
What was what is what is needed, what needs to be done.
I think we we should we should get back a little bit and and think about European Union as a whole. Well, the the we we should think about multi-level governance, which is not just just a posh phrase, very often not not understood quite right. I I will be speaking from my experience here in Croatia, where we have we have seen well, legislation coming from Brussels, obviously, even even significant amount of money coming from Brussels as well. And then that money being used by national government, and in case, for example, when we speak about renovation, if it's about public buildings, it works perfectly. That's fine.
Public buildings, cities, municipalities, ministries apply, that works. But when it's about citizens, especially low-income citizens or or middle-income citizens, that doesn't work because there is there is a missing missing layer, missing link there, which is local and regional level, cities especially. I'm I'm very happy that my city of Zagreb is going to launch one-stop shop soon, but that's that's what I will I will I will repeat again. One of my request was to make local delivery structure eligible partners and and even direct beneficiaries of implementation programs. Without that layer, without cities, municipalities or regions in some cases, we are we are very different, our countries are very different.
However, that layer is is crucial if we want to deliver renovation for citizens.
Rémi Collombet
Many thanks. To answer some of the the questions that were mentioned, I think the main barriers that we're seeing at at the moment are the usual ones: first, access to information and access to funding. Implementation of current legislation is meant to address partially those barriers with the deployment of one-stop shops, facilitation of support for citizens that want to engage in in the renovations of their of their buildings. And we're seeing that there is improvement that need to happen in the support programs that we have currently in Europe. They're currently poorly targeted.
The little public money that we have should go to the most vulnerable households that have no other means. Now, and the rest should should be used to guarantee and de-risk private financing. Investments in energy efficiency have a return. So basically, a lot of the owner-occupiers have the potential to invest in their in their home, but the conditions at which they receive private financing has to make sense financially for them to do so. If you you are offered a loan at 7, 8, 9%, that does not really make sense financially to engage.
So really making sure that there's private finance that's available but at an affordable rate is definitely something that could have positive impact in the sector.
On the rental sector, we're seeing some countries that have taken steps, my own for example, in France, there's a measure banning the renting of G buildings, the worst energy performance class, to push landlords also to renovate the homes that they're renting out. So it's a combination of stick and carrot, you get subsidies to renovate the flat that you put on the market, but you also have this obligation to do so otherwise you cannot do it in the future.
Irene Tinagli
Okay, thank you very much. Now I give the floor to the next MEP, Isilda Gomes from the S&D.
Isilda Gomes
Muito obrigada, presidente. Em primeiro lugar quero agradecer aos oradores. I'm going to speak in Portuguese. Quero agradecer aos oradores que de facto nos trouxeram aqui um debate muito interessante e, digamos, informações também muito úteis. Em primeiro lugar falou-se inclusivamente na industrialização da construção de habitação.
Nós precisamos de facto de muita habitação. E se precisamos, eu posso de facto informar porque já vi que hoje as casas podem ser construídas dentro de uma empresa, dentro de uma fábrica, e serem colocadas no local onde há terreno para poderem ser plantadas. Portanto, a industrialização é fundamental. Diminui os custos, diminui o tempo de construção e em termos energéticos, obviamente, já são obrigadas a cumprir aquilo que são os pré-requisitos. Portanto, estas casas podem ser acessíveis e são acessíveis em termos energéticos.
Falou-se muito aqui no financiamento e financiamento também para as autoridades locais e regionais de fundos públicos. E a minha questão é esta: toda a gente sabe, dos meus colegas que estão aqui, que eu fui uma das pessoas que tenho lutado sempre para que haja um fundo só para a habitação, um fundo dedicado à habitação, seja para construção, seja exatamente para a recuperação energética. Mas infelizmente parece-me que no orçamento não vamos ter esse fundo dedicado só para a habitação. E aquilo que é dito é que, naturalmente, deixa-se nas mãos dos governos o poder ir aos fundos de coesão ou outros fundos buscar verbas para poderem dedicar à habitação. E eu pergunto: até hoje isso aconteceu?
Não. Os fundos de coesão foram aplicados em muitas outras coisas menos na habitação. E por isso é que chegamos ao ponto a que chegamos neste momento de termos como principal preocupação na Europa a habitação. É que não é só a recuperação das habitações que já estão construídas. É novas habitações para quem não tem capacidade de pagar, para que, como se disse aqui, pagam mais de 100% em rendas e em, por exemplo, em eletricidade para se manterem dentro de uma casa.
Portanto, acreditam que se não tivermos esse fundo público só para a habitação vamos ter as respostas que precisamos? Eu não acredito. A menos que a Comissão dê orientações claras aos governos de dizer que X% do fundo de coesão tem que ser aplicado na construção de habitação. Caso contrário vamos continuar com aquilo que aconteceu até agora, que é constroem-se pontes, constroem-se hospitais, constroem-se escolas, que tudo isso é necessário, mas as pessoas continuam a viver na rua, muitas delas, e outras a viver da forma como nós sabemos, sem conseguirem pagar a casa. Muito obrigada.
Irene Tinagli
Thank you very much. I had one little short question myself and then I give back the floor to the our guest speakers. This is particular for Mr. Gebauer. You mentioned that the model consists in charging a small quote, a monthly quote to the tenants that is used in a fund for renovation and retrofit that you can access when is needed. In terms of percentage, how much this adds up to the to the rent just to to have an idea?
And is so this is fully sustainable or do you have had moments or types of renovations that proved to be more expensive than this and you needed more or this is perfectly sustainable?
Michael Gehbauer
Thank you for the question. As we ask our tenants for a cost rent, that means we don't have any money for maintenance. So we have to build a fund for maintenance and this starts with 0.68 euros in the first five years and it ends after 30 years by 2.35 euros. So that means this is a additional amount the tenants pay and it's dedicated for renovation and for maintenance and we can use it also for decarbonization. And this money is used for the house where the people live.
It's only for the for the concrete for the it's it's dedicated for the place where they live.
Michael Gehbauer
Per square meter, yes. Between 0.68 euros in the first five years and it goes up to in 30 years a building which is 30 years old the tenants pay the 2.35 euros for this maintenance fund. And this money is dedicated for maintenance and for renovation and we can also use it for decarbonization measures. And it can only be used for the place where they live. It can be an object with 100 flats or apartments, it can be a place with 300 and it's used for this complex where the people live.
It's dedicated especially for this house where they live.
Irene Tinagli
Ah, okay, so it's bounded for that kind of oh I see. Okay. Thank you, this is very, very informative and very useful. Other speakers, yes.
Rémi Collombet
Sure, maybe to answer the question on the MFF and where the money comes from. We looked into this and the current period has been good for energy efficiency in terms of the financing that's been allocated. The money comes mainly from cohesion funds at EU level and the Recovery and Resilience Facility. Where looking forward we see a potential gap with the end of the Recovery and Resilience Facility at the end of this year. The next MFF is being negotiated so we don't really know what is going to be in there.
There's more flexibility that's been granted so less specificity regarding allocation to specific sectors but we really see and hope to see a bit more of dedicated funding through the national and regional partnership plans to housing and renovation.
There's also space in the ECF, the European Competitiveness Fund, especially in InvestEU, to make better use of guarantees for renovation. And the final part of the MFF where there needs to be potential amendments is the performance regulation where we need to make sure that actions towards renovations are properly rated or graded so that they contribute fully to the climate mainstreaming targets.
José Manuel González Martín
Gracias, yo contestar nada más a lo de la industrialización muy rápido. No es la panacea. La industrialización hoy por hoy en viviendas en altura no es nada fácil. Estamos hablando del 40-45% de industrialización, es decir, hacerlo en factoría y llevarlo al suelo. Necesitamos tiempo, necesitamos formación y necesitamos sobre todo tecnología.
Eso nos va a llevar en altura. Las unifamiliares está resuelto y en madera también. Gracias.
Barbara Steenbergen
Thank you. Also obrigada Mrs. Gomes for your question. I think it's very relevant that we also put the big picture on the table. I quote the own report of the European Commission Directorate-General ECFIN, Economic and Financial Affairs, together with the Joint Research Centre. We have an investment gap in affordable housing of 1.68 trillion euros.
This is big money. We need to build in the next 10 years 7.14 million units on top. So with all respect, members of the European Parliament, Mr. Baldwin from the European Commission, this is more than just cohesion funds and dedicating a little bit of the part or rededicate a little bit of the cohesion funds also for affordable housing. I think I follow my predecessor, this is competitiveness. I underline again, this must be a dedicated issue.
This cannot run next to all the other things that we have in cohesion funds, especially as we know that the biggest housing demand is in the countries France, Italy, Spain, Germany. So they are not the first in line receiving cohesion funds money. So the booming regions. So we have to make another mainstreaming in that and we have the chance now if we want to take this serious. And I'm absolutely sure that this is taken serious.
We have an own commissioner for housing and energy. We have a task force in the European Commission who makes a good work. Mathieu, you do it. And we have this special committee in the European Parliament chaired by Mrs. Tinagli who does an incredible work in really putting all the things together, naming the problems but also showing the solutions. So if we take this serious, this is not only talking about something, then also money must follow.
And I also think we have an incredible chance. We have now next Monday we have the EU Council dedicated on housing issue. We have the Irish presidency coming, Mr. Moloney, where we have a ministerial meeting on the 25th of November if I'm not mistaken. Perhaps we even have a leaders' summit of all the European chancellors and statesmen on that. So I think there is a big, as we say here, window of opportunity now.
And if we put all our hands on deck, as we say in Dutch, I think we can really make it. Thank you.
Irene Tinagli
Thank you very much. Any other request for the floor from our speakers, if there is anything that you may want to add? If not, I'm very glad to give the floor, you were just mentioned, to Matthew Baldwin, head of the task force in the European Commission for housing.
Matthew Baldwin
Thank you very much indeed, Madam Chair. What a really excellent discussion this has been and brought beautifully to a crescendo by Barbara, if I may say. Every time my spirits flag, I think, oh, it's a hot afternoon, how are we going to manage any of these difficult issues, and you just spring us back, and thank you very much. I completely concur with your very warm words about the role of the House Committee and our chairman of this House Committee for the way you have brought difficult topics to the table and brought excellent groups of experts together for the discussions. Thank you for your kind words.
We are, I think, conscious, all of us, the different institutions, the Council, the Parliament, and the Commission, that we are starting out on this journey. And we cannot solve all of our problems immediately, and in one of my more detailed remarks, I'll pour a small glass of cold water on your optimism on everything, including on some of the finance questions, but I want to thank you very much for that very warm conclusion. Briefly, Madam Chair, I think I heard a lot of calls for joined-up thinking. Joined-up thinking, it is ridiculous to separate energy policy from housing policy, heating policy from cooling policy, and also the renovation, if I may, and repurposing from new construction. These are all things we need to do in a joined-up way.
And lastly, poverty is itself indivisible. It is, you cannot separate out energy poverty from housing poverty. As you said it very well indeed, Barbara, we have so many people in energy poverty, 34 million. One of my commissioners' favorite or least favorite statistics is to talk about the number of people who cannot afford to heat and cool their buildings. And it doesn't matter if you're a citizen whether you cannot pay your electricity bills, your constituents with their arrears in their bills, or you can't make your rent.
You're stuck, and you're stuck in a place-based situation, and that is something we really have to tackle in a joined-up way. And I'm glad we are doing so. To give you an example, when we talk about the financing of energy efficiency and the big task ahead of us, and I'll come back to this in terms of the financing of affordable housing, you don't divide those issues up at the level of an individual project, a neighborhood, or indeed an overall policy. We are bringing them together through a joint call for experts in the Energy Efficiency Financing Coalition and the Pan-European Investment Platform, and we are calling also for national hubs to be built, if they don't exist already, to support both sides of that equation on a national level.
We don't always need new structures. I also very much agree with that. Let's use what we have. We are a long way down with the work going on towards energy climate plans, building off the work set out in the Energy Poverty Advisory Hub. And let's use some of this work in a joined-up way, for example relating to the 100 climate-neutral cities and to share the experiences that cities have faced.
Our friend in Zagreb, I don't know if he's still there, about how important that is in terms of tackling energy bills as well. I think we also agree on the need for multi-level governance, but I also totally agree, I hate that phrase. I don't think it conveys precisely what it's supposed about bringing that action across different levels of government in a meaningful way. And I think we also very much agree with getting to the local level through the energy communities approach and the energy communities action plan. Then maybe this is my small area where I can't say so much.
It is very difficult for the Commission to comment on the ongoing negotiations in relation to the next Multiannual Financial Framework, including on all that range of issues which to summarize what you said about the need for a fund, about earmarking. And I know that's hotly supported by some of the biggest fans of housing and I totally understand the heat of that support. We need also to recognize that some people have other priorities. And so once you get into an earmarking game, it may reduce your leverage ultimately if we're forced to choose between different priorities, and of course defense being the major one. I would defend a little bit how much we have achieved on cohesion and the RRF as you've mentioned.
45 billion over this financing period. I know that is a drop in the ocean compared to what is needed, but it is not insignificant. And when we go back to Member States and say, are you ready to do more in the reprogramming period generated by Vice-President Fitto, again almost 10% of that additional funding was generated, a lot of it of course coming identified coming from Italy. The President when she launched, when she made her speech launching the Commission's proposals for the next Multiannual Financial Framework, sorry President of the Commission, she used housing as a good example of how this could fit into the NRPPs. But I also agree with those who said that we need to look hard at what the ECF can achieve and using the leveraging mechanisms of InvestEU as well.
So finally let's, you know, all the time when we talk about some of the great ideas we've had surfaced today, housing cost neutrality, let's not take those concepts and run blindly with them. Let's unpack the principles through things like the Housing Alliance which we've launched just the last couple of weeks, work on these issues together, develop consensus for areas where we don't have total competence. I don't have the ability to click my fingers and say yes, let's deliver on this. It needs to be done together with those who have responsibility for housing policy, with the Member States and the cities and regions. And to now borrow Barbara's optimism, I think we can get there if we also always remember that it's the people we're talking about here.
It's the citizens who are suffering in housing and energy bills. This week we are going to be overwhelmed with terrible stories about people suffering in the heatwaves across Europe. But that's the weekly reality for people suffering in the housing affordability crisis and let's not forget that. Thank you.
Irene Tinagli
Thank you Matthew, thank you very much for this very interesting and inspiring speech.
I don't think I have much to add to this because our experts and Matthew, our MEPs, I think we have really dig deep in this very relevant topic and I really wish all of you a good evening. Thank you very much.