Name: Committee on Employment and Social Affairs Ordinary meeting
Uploaded: 2026-07-16T07:30:00+00:00
Duration: 3936 s

04:02 - 05:51

Speaker 4

All right, good morning everyone and welcome back to committee meeting. As next item on the agenda, I would like to welcome you all to today's exchange of views on the proposal for a Council recommendation on combating housing exclusion. Today's discussion concerns not only housing policy, but also social inclusion, prevention, how we build resilient and cohesive societies. Addressing housing exclusion requires long-term thinking, cooperation across different policy areas and levels of governance, and approaches that put people and their needs at the center. While these issues are primarily within the competence of the Member States, the Commission proposal illustrates well the role the European Union can and should play and the added value it can bring by supporting coordination, encouraging the exchange of experience and promoting effective approaches.

The proposal aims to support Member States in strengthening their efforts and sharing best practices. It also provides an opportunity to reflect on how prevention, access to services and sustainable housing solutions can contribute to better outcomes for individuals and communities alike. I am looking forward to today's presentation by the Commission representative as well as to our discussion, which I'm sure will provide valuable insights and much food for thought. And let me also warmly welcome the members of the HOUSE committee who have been invited to take part in today's exchange, as both our committees share a strong interest in this important topic. I would therefore first like to give the floor to Mr. Kieran Malouli, who is the HOUSE Vice-Chair.

So please, Mr. Malouli, the floor is yours for two minutes.

05:51 - 10:18

Speaker 5

Thank you, Chair. I want to thank you for the invitation, firstly, to speak this morning on behalf of our special housing committee. And indeed also thank the representatives of the Commission, Jiri Svarc, the head of the unit in social policies in DG EMPL, for the presentation to be given today of the strategy. It's a, you know, a really is an obvious link between these two committees. I think it's an important get-together.

That's a natural link between housing and social inclusion policy, and I would welcome closer cooperation between our EMPL and housing teams as we go forward in the coming months after the summer break. Colleagues, I think firstly this morning I want to speak about the Council recommendation, which of course is at the heart of why we're here today. The recommendation which was presented on the 6th of May in 2026 alongside the first ever EU anti-poverty strategy, a very important moment for the Parliament. Colleagues will recall, you know, the scale of this challenge. 92.7 million people, that's 20.9% of the EU population, are at risk of poverty or social inclusion in 2025, and around 1 million homeless right across our Union.

The scale of the emergency facing us is indeed colossal. From our perspective as a housing committee, colleagues will know that the Parliament adopted the resolution on the 10th of March 2026 on the housing crisis under the rapporteur Mr. Boza-Gimenez-Larez of the EPP. And colleagues will know, you know, we have discussed the scale of the affordability problem that has motivated our work. House prices in the EU have risen by more than 60% and rents by more than 20% over the course of the past decade, and it is affecting all Europeans without exception.

The resolution itself records that around 1.3 million people are homeless and sleeping rough or in emergency accommodation at any given night in the EU. Almost 400,000 of them, shockingly, are children. And the resolution explicitly invokes principle 19 of the European Pillar of Social Rights on adequate shelter and services for the homeless. As an Irish member of this committee, I'm more than familiar with the scale of the problem. Our small country with a population of less than 6 million people has over 16,000 people on the homeless register and shockingly 5,000 of them are children, something we're not very proud of and something that should in itself motivate the Irish presidency in the coming months, I hope.

Colleagues, the resolution calls for the European affordable housing plan to be aligned with the European Pillar of Social Rights and to help tackle social inequalities and indeed eradicate poverty in the EU alongside the important work of promoting social, economic and indeed territorial cohesion. Now our committee has worked on this matter for many, many months and we welcome the recommendation's emphasis on housing-led approaches. We welcome that key focus on eviction prevention and expanding social and affordable housing supply, which complement the Parliament's own resolution. And you know, we want to signal that as a non-binding instrument, its impact will depend on the implementation by member states at the end of the day. As you quite said, quite rightly, Chair, in your introduction, much of these matters are competency of the member state, so it is down to the member states to act in these areas.

But many open questions remain for us to deal with, notably on the definitions and the comparable data available on homelessness. So Chair, I want to say that you will find the housing committee more than cooperative and more than willing to work with you in the coming months. There is a willingness there among all of our colleagues across all sides of the Parliament to work closely with EMPL as this file moves forward in the Council. And indeed, I note on your next point in the agenda today, my colleague from Ireland, the Irish minister coming in, the minister dealing with rural and community affairs and social matters. It is a rather important matter for the Irish.

They will have the baton in their hands now for the coming six months. Regrettably, I'm going to another committee myself to deal with matter of legislation in a few moments, but I'll be watching carefully what our colleague the minister has to say. So once again, thank you for the invitation and I look forward to this morning's debate. Thank you.