Pedro Sánchez recovers the Ministry of Housing and puts one of his most loyal names in charge of it, Isabel Rodríguez, until now Minister of Territorial Policy and Spokesperson for the Executive. The appointment is more symbolic than effective, taking into account that the majority of powers in housing are transferred to the autonomous communities and city councils, but it gives an idea of the importance that the Government wants to give to this area in the coming years. .
The new portfolio also adds Urban Agenda and the person in charge has before him the challenge of giving a boost to the measures that Sánchez announced in the last months of the last legislature to build, at least, the 183,000 promised homes to incorporate them into the public residential stock.
Rodríguez must also promote the application of the Housing Law that sparked so much controversy in the previous mandate. After four years of negotiations and one year of entry into force, the norm has not transcended into the practical field and that will be one of the missions of the new minister.
The most urgent thing in this sense is the creation of the rental price reference index, whose approval has been announced for months as “imminent” but has still not occurred.
Rodríguez thus moves from the spokesperson of the Executive to a portfolio that the Government wants to place as one of the spearheads of the coming years. Access to housing has become one of the main social concerns in Spain, under the protection of rental and purchase prices that have skyrocketed in recent years.