"It has now come to this" -- My latest opinion column for Catalonia Today magazine

Cars and vans parked in a street. QUIM PUIG.

[This article was first published in Catalonia Today magazine, Oct. 2022.]

The following is based on current and factual information…

How would you fancy sleeping in a car or a van?

Rather than the now antiquated 20th century idea of having your own bed in something as outdated as a house, for the price of two euros a day our new business in Barcelona will fulfill this fantasy for you. And for only 60 euros a month on a prime real-estate public street!

Naturally, there are those in the city council who want to curb your right to get your shut-eye shut out of buildings but they just don’t understand an adventurous spirit. Don’t let them tell you what to do and where you can and can’t do it. You work hard every day and you deserve what we call a “micro space” to match your macro dreams.

We are opening in a small, quiet and almost-deserted square in the Sant Andreu district. In the same location you can rub shoulders with customers of our beehive flats. On top of all that, for a mere 90 euros per month you can go inside, hang out on a plastic chair for the entire day, have a shower, store food, use the complimentary microwave, or even wash your clothes. Now that’s what we call livin’, baby!

Yes, it’s true that those small-minded lefty bureaucrats in the council have assured everybody that our operation won’t actually be legal but in the meantime you can make us your home. We’ve traded in the semi-legal shadows for years so we’re at home with that, even if you’re not!

OK, it’s not exactly what most people call home and it’s temporary but let’s not quibble about semantics. You need a mattress and we can rent you one. That’s just free-market capitalism in operation and who should stand in the way of your good night’s sleep. So, wind up the windows, click the locks on the doors and snuggle up for sweet dreams!

Oh, and another thing that you don’t need to concern yourself with. We admit that municipal tow trucks have already taken some of the sleeper vehicles away but this is just a minor inconvenience. In the unlikely event we are discriminated against again in this way, we’ll refund half of your fee and find you another vehicle to nod off in. You can’t say fairer than that, can you?

As for our premium accommodation we even have a waiting list for others to live in homes that are no bigger than three square metres. We acknowledge that at the moment those are also prohibited in Barcelona but they’ve got them in Japan and “anything-goes Madrid” so why not here too?

I know you’ve heard stories of paper thin walls and hearing other people’s alarms going off and being kept awake by neighbour’s snoring…but just relax. Humans can get used to anything. Eventually.

The truth is as simple. You just don’t have a right to human-sized accommodation anymore. Society can’t deliver this to everyone so some people need to learn that they aren’t lucky enough to be comfortable, secure or well-housed. A lie-down bed isn’t a right, it’s a privilege!

Barcelona's homeless union now a reality

 

Spikes to stop street sleepers outside a shop on la Rambla

 "A homeless union is born in Barcelona: "There cannot be people sleeping on the street with 13,000 empty flats", they say’."

[From elDiario.es here: (First found through Business Over Tapas news service.)]

AND see here for semi-related news of the latest Covidiocy: Last night's planned insanity/experiment/super-spreader event in Barcelona.

"You can't sleep here!"

The appalling sight of metal spikes to stop homeless people sleeping outside the doorway of a vacant building on Rambla de Catalunya in Barcelona. 

I took this photo this week. Not in the early 20th century. 

Londoners and New Yorkers will also recognise this anti-human architecture.

I first wrote about this (and a related) theme in this article tilted "Poor Doors" in 2014. 

Video (3.38 mins): "We are invisible to most people" -- A day in the life of Jose, a homeless language teacher

Talking about life on the streets and his (continuing) work as a teacher.  

Filmed around Barcelona city by OTOXO Productions and Barcelona Street Talk (now defunct).

"Squatting in Vilafranca" -- My latest column for Catalonia Today magazine

[Graffiti wall in Vilafranca: “Enough speculation! The Penedès is not for sale!]

 If global warming is likely to be the biggest problem facing society in the coming years, it will certainly be competing with housing as an issue of great public concern. 

While the situation is probably most severe in Barcelona, the people of a medium-sized Catalan town such as Vilafranca del Penedès are certainly not free from these pressures.

One group who have acted against what they see as a major cause of housing difficulties is a squatter's collective that supports the politics of the Esquerra Independentista [independent left] movement. Recently, they took occupation of a former industrial building in the north of Vilafranca and have re-named it “El Taller” (The Workshop).

“We have done this to protest against real estate speculation,” says their 21-year-old spokesman, who did not wish to be named or photographed. “But we also want to do productive things with this place. We are converting it into somewhere for people to meet to discuss politics, to drink coffee, and to have concerts and theatre performances. We are even creating a studio upstairs.”

According to the collective, the site they have taken over has been empty for at least four years, and is zoned to be eventually knocked down for redevelopment.

“The local people were happy when we moved in because there was a lot of rubbish lying around the building and no one was cleaning it up. But we did,” says their spokesman. “We're making something good out of a place that had no owner and we are doing it without any help from the Vilafranca town council. It was difficult to get this all happening but we will stay here.”

In a very different position to those who occupy vacant buildings are Vilafranca residents, Teresa and Jose. They have a rural property outside the town that is being lived in by a man without their permission. The couple have tried to avoid legal proceedings with the squatter for several years but have recently changed their approach of attempts at persuasion and conciliation.

“We were told we needed a judge's order to get him out of our house,” Teresa explains. “Our decision was to hire a private lawyer because using a public one takes much more time.”

“The procedure has taken two months to get to court and has cost us two thousand euros, but at the moment he's still there and he has smashed up half the house,” says Jose.

Speaking to some other people over lunch in Vilafranca, it is not difficult to find a common theme. There seems to be an acceptance that the government could not or would not do much to solve problems relating to housing. Apart from one suggestion that taxes should be reduced on houses, there is little genuine hope that improvements were possible coming from elected representatives.

“The introduction of the euro was what started our struggles,” says Silvia. “And the price of houses is the other burden. We pay more than double compared to those in southern Spain. The middle class has shrunk completely. Everything needs to be changed!”

Without knowing it, another woman also agrees with the squatters collective on the subject of profiteering in the real estate industry. She suggests that the high levels of speculation now means that for single people it is impossible to buy a house or even rent a decent apartment.
“Everyone has to live with their parents or share accommodation with at least one other person if they are to afford to have any quality of life,” she argues.

There is something here that is beyond dispute, though. Almost anyone would see the common sense in a group of energetic and optimistic young people making good use of a long-abandoned building, as with the Vilafranca squatters group. However, the question that does remain is: How should this happen, both legally and ethically?

[This article was first published in Catalonia Today magazine, February 2017.]

"A Little-Known Perspective on the Life of Homeless People in France — Their Own"

(Tents from charity ‘Les Enfants de Don Quichotte’ on the banks of the Canal Saint-Martin, Paris. From Wikipedia Creative Commons 2.0`)

"There are many preconceived ideas about the lives of the homeless in France. The most widespread amongst them are as follows:

• “It's a declining trend in France.”

The total number of homeless people in France (excluding refugees in the camps in Calais) is difficult to estimate, but the FNARS, a national organisation for social inclusion and re-insertion, estimates the figure to be between 150,000 and 240,000 people. The Fondation Abbé Pierre, a homeless charity based on the benevolence of its namesake, a 20th century Catholic priest, estimates that there are 50% more homeless people in France than three years ago — including 30,000 children.

• “To be homeless is an active choice.”

A study shows that only 6% of homeless people choose to live on the streets.

• “The homeless don't work.”

Many homeless people are employed on fixed-term or temporary contracts.

In an attempt to correct the narrative about the homeless, some homeless people in France over the years have told their stories in their own words on social media. Let's meet three of them: Stéphane, Francis and ‘SDF75′, who all have at one point offered insight into their lives on their respective blogs.

‘I am a computer programmer first and a homeless person second’

SDF75 explained why he wanted to create a different blog:


Read more from source at Global Voices here.

"Poor doors" - My latest opinion column for Catalonia Today magazine

When I was a kid and just starting to try and understand the adult world I used to hear my parents and other grown-ups make what seemed to be jokes about the "tradesman's entrance." 

I eventually learned that these words were a kind of sexual slang for the anus but were also more literally "the side or back door of a large house, used, especially in the past, by people delivering goods who were not allowed to use the main entrance at the front of the house."

Now though, another somewhat similar kind of entry/exit is becoming common in new apartment blocks in those two western-world trendsetters cities of New York and London. Tenants in these buildings must use two different entrances, depending on whether they live in the cheaper flats or the expensive part of the accommodation.

New York mayor Bill de Blasio has stated his opposition to what some of the city's residents have called "poor doors" although his administration has approved a number that have already been planned and built. 

Arguing in their favour, David Von Spreckelsen, senior vice president at US property developers Toll Brothers was reported as saying "You have politicians saying how horrible these back doors are. I think it’s unfair to expect very high-income homeowners who paid a fortune to live in their building to have to be in the same boat as low-income renters, who are very fortunate to live in a new building in a great neighborhood." 

The mayor of London, Boris Johnson is refusing to ban poor doors despite an increasing number of developments in the English capital having so-called "alternative access." Even bicycle storage spaces, rubbish disposal facilities and postal deliveries are also being separated in some residential complexes. 

One argument has been that doing so keeps construction costs down but in New York there are financial incentives to include "affordable" flats in the same location as luxury ones. So it is now apparent that architects are too often entirely at the mercy of owners and investors and will do whatever is necessary to keep them happy.

In central London there is another phenomenon that is becoming more publicised. 

Outside several housing buildings and supermarkets, sharp metal spikes have been put into the concrete in the corner of the doorway outside, clearly as a way of preventing homeless people from sleeping there. One charity says this has actually been a common practice for over a decade and I recently saw a photo of a progressive activist pouring liquid concrete to cover over these metal studs.

It's no coincidence that at this very same time the UK Border Agency has recently admitted that it is working on plans for fast-track passport lanes for travellers of "high economic value" (ie. rich) at British airports. 

Supposedly this is needed so that they do not have to wait in the queue like the rest of the species. 

I'm not pretending that there are not more significant problems in our world at this moment but poor doors, anti-homeless studs and immigration lines that divide people according to the size of their bank balance are all symptoms of a sickness, a backward habit of mind.

After all the public talk is done and the justifications have been made, these things end up encouraging lesser treatment of those without the good fortune to be wealthy. 

When the smaller details of life of are changed - doors, queues, public places - it creates less public resistance to the idea of changing bigger details. 

In this way, schools or health services can be separated along class lines, without us really noticing.

[This article was first published in Catalonia Today magazine, October 2014.]

Homeless in Barcelona

Matthew Tree

Matthew Tree's beautiful, simple opinion piece in El Punt Avui on the weekend...

"Yolanda Aguila lives on the street - on my street, in fact. I started talking to her a week ago. (For seventeen weeks she has had no home).

She did live in an apartment with other people until the council made an inspection and the owner - instead of doing the renovations necessary to get a new certificate of habitability - made them all move out.

Therefore, Yolanda is newly homeless. In fact, when you talk to her, if not for the fact that the conversation takes place on a piece of sidewalk occupied by her and her only suitcase, you would not guess that she has no fixed address.

Despite a difficult past (taking antidepressants) and poor health (suffering from fibromyalgia and calcification of the bones) she is doing (very) well, mentally.

She is 45 years old, likes historical novels (now for example, she is reading Victus by Albert Sánchez Piñol) and eats regularly, thanks to a bar that gives her unsold sandwiches every day.

Yolanda tries to give some of this food to other people who are living in her area without a roof over their heads, but most of them do not want to eat, only to drink, in an attempt, she guesses, to kill themselves slowly.

She has tried every charity, but most just offer a meal or clothes when what you really need back, above anything else, is a room to rent.

Life on the street for her is especially uncomfortable because she suffers from diseases. The last time I saw her, she was crying in frustration.

How is it that this woman is on the street when it costs so little to get her off the street? 

If Alícia Sánchez-Camacho [the leader of the Catalan branch of Spain's ruling Popular Party] - who says that we must confront the real problems of the people - sold one of her black crocodile skin handbags, there would be enough money to get a room for Yolanda Aguila.

Anyway, if anyone has any suggestions please contact me through El Pinu/Avui at mtree@elpunt.info "