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Good afternoon, colleagues. Welcome to this House, committee meeting.

Before we, start, I have some preliminary remarks.

Today's meeting is web streamed on Parliament's website. We have interpretation in 12 languages.

Now some chairs mention all those languages,

but I think we can also skip that in order to proceed swiftly to the exchange with the Commissioner.

I propose that the Chair's announcement on 0.2 under the draft agenda be moved to after the exchange with the Commissioner,

so announcements for after that part of this meeting.

If there is no objection, we simply move on with the agenda.

So there is a 0.3 you want me to adopt the minutes, right?

So the minutes of the 24th of June, the 29th of June,

and the 13th of July are hereby then adopted if there are no complaints about them.

Then, 0.4 and that's the main menu of of today.

It is a, another, let's say, milestone in our work on Europe's housing policy,

and it is a pleasure to welcome you again, Commissioner Jørgensen, to this meeting.

I have to excuse, of course, President Tinaïg, who should have been here in my place, but she asked me to replace her.

Housing affordability has become one of the defining challenges facing our Union,

across Member States, and particularly in our cities, metropolitan areas and tourist regions.

A growing number of citizens, including young people,

and I'm happy to see a lot of them also in this room today essential workers and increasingly middle income households are struggling to have access to decent and affordable housing.

This is not only a societal concern, it also affects labor mobility,

competitiveness and cohesion across our societies.

So this committee was established, and your position as a Housing Commissioner was established to dive into this crisis,

and this is felt across the EU as an absolute crisis,

and in most of our Member States it is a top 3 topic of political concern.

Where our voters and anyone trying to start a family or move or be active and start their lives is confronted with the hurdles of the current housing market.

So after our committee's final report to the European Parliament, Adopted, which was 10 March, its resolution on the housing crisis in the European Union,

calling for ambitious and coordinated action at Union level while fully respecting the competencies of Member States and of regional and local authorities in the field of housing,

which I suspect will be of particular interest in today's meeting.

We therefore welcome the Commission's commitment reflected in the Affordable housing plan.

Presented in December 25, this is really pioneering work on the European level, and it is not easy for the staff in the Commission,

I suppose it was a new endeavor,

so in that sense also congratulations to those efforts being made to bring forward concrete legislative and non-legislative.

Measures to support Member States in addressing this crisis.

Commissioner, I understand the Affordable Housing Act you will present to us today is accompanied by further material.

I saw some links to an impact assessment, which, you know, we like very much, and we will probably also be asking about it.

The Act was adopted this morning in College.

For any future references, if you wish to present legal proposals first in this room,

rather than in the press room of the European Commission,

you're more than welcome, but it is another important step in this process.

Despite the short notice, I'm confident that Members already have a clear understanding of the direction of the initiative taken today,

just as you probably also understand the direction that our questions will be taken.

This exchange is an important opportunity for our.

To hear directly from you and from the Commission's approach, and I suggest that I give you the floor to present the initiative,

and then we will have a list of speakers as usual.

You have 12 minutes, so you are free to use that time fully or less,

but when you go over, I will intervene. Thank you very much, Commissioner. Thank you.

So, so, I know the chairman from the gym,

so I will stay within time because I know how strong he is, so.

And friends, thank you so much for, for inviting me, I,

I do think it's fair to say that today's presentation is a is a milestone.

This is the first regulatory proposal that we put forward under my mandate.

And what we're trying to address is some of the major concerns that has been voiced. Very, very urgently. By member states, governments, parliaments.

But especially by mayors, local governments, citizens, NGOs, tenant organizations, unions,

there's not one single topic that has gotten as much attention.

In the area of housing, I would say as short term rentals.

Short term rentals is not the only focus of the act, but it is certainly a very important one, so I'll start with that.

So I don't need to share with you the analysis of what our problem is and how serious it is,

because we've talked about that many times, but just maybe a few numbers.

We know now from Eurobarometer that 40% of all Europeans consider the lack of affordable housing a serious and urgent problem.

For cities that number is 51,

so more than every second person in our cities in Europe considers this a really serious problem.

This tells us that we need to act now.

Some people say, is this even a European competency?

Is it even something that you need to deal with?

And I can give a bureaucratic answer and I can give a political answer, and I think Since we're here today, I'll give you both. The bureaucratic answer. Yes, short term rentals, it's a service.

Services are regulated, of course, as one of the freedoms in the European Union.

Second home vacant buildings, that's got to do with capital.

Capital is of course also regulated in the common market, so.

Regulation of services and capital is obviously a European matter.

The political answer is If something is on the top 3 on the agenda of our citizens,

and as the chairman said, in many, in many countries it is indeed that some, it's even 1. Then we cannot just lean back.

Then we need to act at the European Parliament election where Olof you were elected.

In many member states it was number one on the agenda, so I used to serve in this house,

as many of you know, for many years, and I don't remember ever having discussed housing.

I don't remember one question ever in the hundreds of thousands of meetings I've been to,

because it wasn't that big of a problem and it wasn't considered a European one,

but because it now is such a big problem, citizens expect us to act.

My personal belief is that citizens don't really care that much on which level decisions are made to solve a problem.

They just want it solved, and they expect us to work together.

City councils, regional governments, national governments, European Union.

So this is what we attempt to do.

Now, on short term rentals, in many cities, this has grown out of control.

Obviously short term rentals is, is in many ways a good thing. It means that we can travel more.

It means that we support tourism, creates jobs. Olof these things are good things. It's good also that Sometimes families can.

Get some extra help to pay their bills because they are able to rent out a room or their their home for,

for some time, which is fine, but when it leads to people being crowded out of their houses.

When it leads to parts of cities where in reality there's no longer any local people living because it's just short term rentals because there's more money to be made from the people who own the buildings,

and when that overall happens in a way so that these areas are under, under,

under stress, then, then it's fair, I think, and legitimate, I think, to act.

Now, with vacant homes and vacant buildings,

obviously it's a different challenge, but there are similarities.

Around 20% of our homes in Europe are vacant.

And I can understand why some citizens say, OK, so we have a huge housing crisis.

But every 5th home that I see, nobody lives there. It's a paradox, at least. Why do people not live there? Well, sometimes it's second homes.

Which of course can be fair and legitimate and Olof that. I'm not against second homes at all. I have a summer house myself. Sometimes though, it's, it's for speculation.

Sometimes it's because it's a commodity, it's like instead of buying a gold buy, you buy an apartment and,

and it's, and maybe it's, it's too much of a hassle to rent it out to somebody. So you don't.

Now, again, it's important to say that although I think it's obvious the way I presented that I see this as problems,

that's not really that relevant for what we proposed today because we don't We don't make it mandatory.

That you address these issues, but we make it possible. So we respect the subsidiarity principle.

First of all, we tell the citizens of Europe that we acknowledge that this is a problem.

We also acknowledge that it's a common European problem, and we do acknowledge that we need legal certainty and legal clarity on how to do it,

because we've seen examples of Member States trying to do something to regulate these issues and then being dragged to court.

So we acknowledge these things and then we set up the toolbox.

Or actually, it's not even A well-defined toolbox. It's a legal framework.

That makes it possible for member states to invent the tools that they want.

We of course then have suggestions and proposals, and you can look at what's already being done in some member states,

and I'm sure that these tools will be applied even more in the future.

Certainly now it can be done with legal certainty. So again, just to underline.

Our analysis is that this is a real problem.

Our analysis is that vacant homes and short-term rentals are part of the problem in many places, but we do acknowledge.

That there's also something called the subsidiarity principle, and we do need to respect local democracy so we don't.

We don't order countries, we don't make it obligatory that they impose measures,

but we make it possible. So Will this help?

I am very, very convinced that in many cities it will,

and that we are answering a demand from many many stakeholders and citizens.

But of course we also have to be honest and say this will far from solve Olof our problems, far from.

There are so many other things we need to do.

Many of the things that need to be done obviously needs to be done at a national level, but there are also so many things we can do on a European level.

We need simplification of rules to make it easier to build and renovate.

We need to look at what we can do, especially targeting young people.

We need to look at what about permitting rules.

This is also part of the simplification efforts. What about speculation?

As you know, we've started an analysis to look at the financialization and speculation aspects of this sector.

When we get those results, we'll also have a discussion in this House,

and I suspect probably with differences of opinion on what to do about it.

But then, then at least we will, we will be forced to take it because we will have it there black and white. What's the actual problem.

We need to do whatever we can also to mobilize more investments. Again this is difficult, but the pan-European.

The investment platform that we've made with the EIB is, is, is taking, I think, steps in the right direction.

We're listening, of course, to member states and stakeholders on whether or not there is more we can do.

We need to do more to fight homelessness, obviously.

Again, difficult to legislate from Brussels on these issues, but we can learn from each other, best practices. We can maybe find funding to help. You're negotiating the next MFF.

I'm sure many of you will be arguing that housing needs to play a bigger role.

Already in this MFF, the EU, we are spending €43 billion on housing issues, so it's not a small thing,

but it is of course spread all over different kinds of issues, but with housing as the central focus point.

So, Chairman, again, having seen you lift weights,

I don't even want to get close to my limit, so I will, I will stop here. Thank you.