The Right to housing is guaranteed in the Spanish constitution (1978). Article 47 provides that one of the “guiding principles of social and economic policy” is the right of Spanish citizens to decent and adequate housing. These "guiding principles” do not receive the strong jurisdictional protection enshrined in the Constitution for "fundamental rights".
The Autonomous Communities have assumed exclusive jurisdiction for housing in their respective Autonomous Statutes Organization Acts, while the State keeps exclusive competences for the basis and coordination of the general planning of economic activity and for the basis for regulations concerning credit.
Most of the regional laws that tried to develop the right to housing in several autonomous communities after 2008 have been challenged before the Constitutional Court by the Central government and almost all of them were suspended and took several years before there was a final ruling.
It is precisely because of the lack of powerful tools in domestic law to adequately protect the right to housing, that lawyers have been forced to use the existing legal instruments and tools at European and international level.
In terms of the Council of Europe, Spain has recently signed and ratified the Revised European Social Charter of 1996 and the Additional Protocol of 1995 providing for a System of Collective Complaints. NGOs and relevant academic actors in Spain have been asking many years for full ratification of the European Social Charter.
Spain signed the United Nations Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (OP-ICESCR) that came into force in 2013. Precisely, the first case resolved by the committee was for violation of the right to housing in Spain. It concerned the eviction of a woman for non-payment of the mortgage installments[1]. The Committee considered that the notification had not been adequate, so that the owner of the property did not know of his eviction until it was carried out. The ESCR Committee called on the Spanish State to give an effective remedy and to introduce changes in the legislation to regulate foreclosure proceedings and the pertinent procedural rules so that they are in accordance with the ICESCR.
In 2017 once again, the Committee[2] found that Spain had violated the right to housing, in particular by not taking all appropriate measures to the maximum of its available resources to guarantee a suitable alternative accommodation in the context of a rental eviction. The Committee urged Spain, to take all necessary measures to help the family obtain adequate housing, as well as paying them a compensation. Spain was also asked to implement a comprehensive plan to guarantee the right to adequate housing for people with low incomes.
Concerning the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) the ESCR Committee issued in 2012 strict recommendations regarding the non-development of the right to housing in the Spanish State. Two main issues were pointed out: mortgage repossessions and related procedural law and lack of social housing.
The 2018 alternative report drafted by civil society organizations insisted on these same issues.
Follow-up of the Concluding Observations, communications and views addressed to the Government of Spain by UN Treaty Bodies such as the CESCR Committee. Advocacy Team, Caritas Española (Spanish)
Many of the decisions taken by the CESCR have been on the right to housing in Spain and there are still a good number of them pending.
