1 March 2013

Spain Suicides Spark New Eviction Law



Spain has approved a two-year moratorium on evicting needy people from their homes in the wake of a pair of suicides and various street protests.
Bloomberg reports the law was passed by royal decree and Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy has said he plans to rush things into action after a woman named Amaya Egaña became the second Spain suicide in less than two months. Egaña leapt to her death from her balcony when officials showed up to change the locks to her apartment.

The Associated Press reports that Spaniards are angry over the evictions. The Spanish government is negotiating bailouts for the banks, while some of those same agencies are repossessing homes and evicting people. Spain has seen nearly 400,000 eviction notices over back mortgages since the recession began in 2008. In an effort to combat the trend, Spain has suspended mortgage payments for those making less than $18,400 or less a year, or a family whose primary earner has exhausted unemployment benefits.

To be safe from eviction, the AP reports a household "must have more than three children, or have children under the age of three, or be elderly, or have disabled people in the household, or be single parents with two children, or be victims of domestic violence."

The Spain suicides and protest have spurred the government to action in a nation that suffers from 25 percent unemployment, a figure expected to rise.





Vocabulary:


Moratorium : moratoria

Needy people: gente necesitada
In the wake of: a raíz de
Passed by Royal Decree: aprobada por decreto real
Rush things into action: darse prisa en actuar, apresurarse a actuar
Leap- leapt - leapt: saltar
Angry over sth:enfadados por algo
Negotiate bailouts: negociar rescates
Repossess:embargar
Evict people:desahuciar a la gente
Eviction notices over… : órdenes de desalojo por…
Combat the trend: combatir/ luchar contra la tendencia.
Suspend: suspender
Mortgage payments: pagos de la hipoteca
Unemployment benefits: subsidios/ prestaciones de desempleo
To be safe from…:para estar protegidos de…
Spur to action: alentar/ impulsar a actuar

37 comments:

  1. I think that the measure of suspend the mortgage will help a lot of people who have economic problems, but i think that is very bad that the government had to see people committing suicide to implement this measure. Nowadays there a lot of people without a place to live or living with her parents for economic problems and for that reason we have to help the people who need help, but the government have to collaborate because if they not, it will be very difficult.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Nowadays, there are lot of people who cannot pay her house because they have a high mortage payements. This is because, a few years ago, when spanish economic was ok, people buy more than they could pay,they banks give a lot of mortatges and this encourage people to buy. Now, spanish economic is bad,and the banks are worried about the situation, so they ask people to return the mortatge.
    I think that the banks should be more mercifull with the people who cannot pay thir mortage, and the govermanemt should do someting to help the people who hasn't got a home, for example, give them the flats who are empty in exange for they look after them.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Is it really ethically stay passives on our homes meanwhile in Spain there are lot of evictions every day? Surely there are people favour and critics. But i can’t have any arguments in favour to this practice. I think it is one of the crimes that are devastating our society. The politicians aren’t doing anything to solving this problem. The government team no have other option than accept the Popular Legislative Initiative with 1’5 millions of signatures. Lot of people are now against of the PAH because they’re practicing the harassment. This may be not correct but people are tired looking as the government are rescuing the banks and allows people die for their homes.

    ReplyDelete
  4. I think that this moratorium will help many people, but I think that is deplorable the fact that people had to commit suicide to be heard. Also, this won't put an end to the problem, I think that what we've to do is what the Finnish did, imprison bankers for what they've done, make business from others sacrifice and suffering, but what government did is to protect them and help them with bailouts, which ones were paid with our taxes, and the banks have the gall to evict people who paid this bailouts.

    ReplyDelete
  5. The government has seen that with these deaths there will be more tension, and what they have done is tell us they want to change this law and protect those who are more vulnerable. Because what else can they do? But, is this the real solution to the problem? This is what happens in Spain, whoever is managing the country, they only take into account their own interests. Politicians make little changes that pretend to be positive and solve people's problems, but they only make us believe everything is OK, instead of truly trying to renew and improve Spain.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I think the situation is quite unfair: the banks are repossessing many people's homes, and now these people will have to adapt to a new life, even harder than the previous one. It's important to know, in addition, that many evicted homes are empty. Moreover, these evictions have led some people to commit suicide. As other classmates who have already written, I think it's a pity that this had to happen so that the government realizes that evictions must be stopped. Nevertheless, I hope the moratorium will favour needy people.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Nowadays all Spaniards are living a difficult situation, for some families more than others. With the suicide of some spanish citiens, unfortunately, the government has responded. They are aware that they should change the laws to improve the situation, and prevent more evictions. They end up giving no solution to this problem. I think that it's a miserable situation and all spanish citizen should act when a close family is evicted from her property

    ReplyDelete
  8. Helping out all those people who unluckily have far more difficulties than the others is something the government should have done long before. I think nobody deserves being evicted, especially these days when money is that hard to obtain. Maybe the problem is that for certain people is so hard to figure how essential is having somewhere to live that their priority is rescuing banks rather than people. Suicides have shown how bad evictions have damaged our society. This situation has to end right now.

    ReplyDelete
  9. I think that nowadays we are going through a bad situation because there are a lot of people who are in crisis and this provokes evictions. This problem would have to be solved because we can't leave that people dies for this reason. There are a lot of people who commits suicides because they have been evicted from their houses. At the end, I think that we should help those who don’t have even to eat because they also deserve to live.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Personally, I think It's a shame that government has begun to act when people has started dying, however the measures they're taking will help people who has less resorces,allowing them to continue living in their apartments and keep a standard of living higher. It must be other way to pay the mortgages instead of evictions, because nobody wins evicting people from their houses, neither banks nor the people.

    ReplyDelete
  11. In my opinion, the new law is not a solution. A lot of people, who doesn't accomplish with the requeriments, will be on the same situations.
    If people doesn't permite to be evicted by the police, little by little, the government can't do nothing and they will be find herself obliged to renounce to her post. In this way, We can stop the dictature of the banks. And make to understand that the banks need us to exist.

    ReplyDelete
  12. This law only prolongs time of eviction, they shouldn't only be taken into account the situation of the family. Also the government should passed a law which not only lengthen the eviction to two years but rather once out of the house debt should disappear. It's not fair that they have to keep paying the debt if you do not live in the house.

    ReplyDelete
  13. I think that the goverment finally has done something good. Approving this law will help people who have economic problems to have less pressure. Spain is no longer a welfare state. Spain is immersid in a huge chaos, we must find a solution. The top parties should arrive to an egreement in order to leave the hole. The should clean up their image from all the corruption cases, and try to cooperate to make spain a big country, not only in sports and gastronomy.

    ReplyDelete
  14. Nowadays, there are a lot of people who cannot pay their mortgage due to the crisis and for this reason every day there are a lot of evictions in many Spanish houses. I think that the law that has been applied by the government was necessary because this problem had produced to some people who cannot pay their mortgage commit suicide. But I also think that protests against evictions have helped to change this law in Spain.

    ReplyDelete
  15. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  16. In my opinion I think that government has taken decisions too late, when the situation couldn't be worse, when till some people were suiciding. It's true that this law will help needy people to prolong the time of their eviction, however, there are some cases when people isn't living in the house, but they have to keep paying the debt, and this isn't fair. In my opinion, banks should help more for improve the situation, due to they're earning milions and milions every month, while a lot of needy people is having big economic problems to survive.

    ReplyDelete
  17. Spain is living a bad situation. I think this law isn't enough to resolve the serious problem, but it can help needy people. Perhaps with this law, people can be helped by their familiars or with little of lucky they can find a job and little by little they'll pay their debts. Maybe it's a dream but nothing is impossible. I think people need hope and trust that there will be a better future and the politicians should be contributed, not with fine words but into actions.

    ReplyDelete
  18. For years, the granting of mortgages has been excessive and banks have granted too many loans of unnecessarily large amounts of money, and with a long time to pay them back.
    Currently, because of unemployment, people in Spain don’t have enough money to pay the credits back to the banks. Due to this, people have lost their homes and, in addition, they continue having the debt with the bank with increased interest rates.
    A lot of people cannot free themselves from the situation of being homeless, jobless and in debt. These people do not receive any help and for this reason they commit suicide.
    Personally, I think that there are solutions for these problems and the possibility to help homeless people exist.

    ReplyDelete
  19. The crisis in Spain make that many people had lost their jobs and, nowadays, they can't pay their morgage. The moratorium of two years would help people that are going to be evicte, but that don't resolve the problem, because in two years this people perhaps don't still have job. The goverment have to continue making laws to protect that group of people, better before they begin to suicide another time.

    ReplyDelete
  20. Nowadays,in our country, many people had to leave their home because of crisi since they couldn't pay their mortgage payments.However, many people as the case of this woman couldn't
    leave her house because she hasn't where to go.Therefore the government had to help that people adopting news laws and so on, but I think that the new law is not a solution because many people doesn't accomplish with the requeriments that the government requiered and conscuently, in this way we are in the same situacion.

    ReplyDelete
  21. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  22. In our society the big industries like the banks are ganing a lot of money without thinking in the affected people.The worst thing is that these industries have the freedom to do it. They swindle with the permission of all the politicians. Nowadays,the money is the real governor. They hide their policy using this moratorium, now people don't complain anymore thinking that they win in their protests. The problem of paying a quantity of money in two weeks for example is still present but in two years.

    ReplyDelete
  23. This new law is a cover up to all the other problems that Spain has at the moment, the economical crisis was the banks fault and they should pay for it so it's good that this new law is trying to help people. They shouldn't try to help the banks that are having financial problems because it was their fault in the first place, especially that the head of these banks are still earning huge amounts of money and making the average person pay for problems that they've greated.

    ReplyDelete
  24. In the last few months, a lot of people has had to leave their house and all their most important properties. They have been stolen, but not by a "normal" thief, they have been stolen by their banks, which have lost all their money and now they have to recuperate it. The most impressive is that the Government and the administration are allowing banks to do that. Many of the people who lose their home don't have an other place where they can sleep or have a shower. It is the worst situation that can be taken place in any country. In my opinion, the Government should start a new policy in order to stop the banks and improving the actual situation.

    ReplyDelete
  25. Mainly Spain has a very big economic problem. This new law will help a lot of people who has though become independent or people who have a house with economics problems. Moreover, This law will prevent many suicides, the most important.

    ReplyDelete
  26. Nowadays there are a lot people that are living a bad situation due to a economical crisis. This situation has caused things as evictions that have generated suicides. I think politicians have many faces but only the face we want to teach good although people aren't stupid. In my opinion, the moratorium don't solve the situation that I have comented because a lot of people can suffer these problems and having where stay but also there are people that if they lose their house is left in the street. Fortunately, there are organizations that help these people.

    ReplyDelete
  27. I think that it is sad that the politicians have realized so late of the serious economic situation that Spain is suffering. Until it has been sad events, such as the suicide of some people, they have not thought about changing the law of evictions. Best of all is that banks leave the street by unpaid family houses, while banks have had to be rescued by public money, of all citizens. If things do not get better soon, I do not know to what extent they will be able to support

    ReplyDelete
  28. Nowadays we are living one of the most sad situations since the 2nd world war, in the human right is established that all the people have the right to a house but this recession is making some people lose their house and consequently they prefer die than live. Maybe this new law will help to solve this problem but I think that the evictions will continue.

    ReplyDelete
  29. I think this new law should have been declared long time ago and many lives would have been saved. We are in a very tough situation and the banks should try to help as many people as possible. The worst thing the banks can do (which they are doing) is living a person homeless, I mean that's not ethical at all. Constition sais that we should all have a resectable home, so we should try to make it happen. In my opinion, a person who is able to take someone's place to live is a murderer, because of his or her fault that someone may prefer to stop living. This is a war but with no fire weapons.

    ReplyDelete
  30. Nowadays many people had to leave their house because they cannot pay it therefore the bank has taken their house by this reason more people has suicide and some street protest. Then the government had to help that people adopting news laws but I think that this will not be enough because many people do not meet these requirements.

    ReplyDelete
  31. All this eviction stuff falls under politics and I'm not one to discuss politics so I haven't been following the news on this. The people being evicted have made mistakes and haven't been able to pay their mortgages, this being the reason for the eviction, but there are also people, like those mentioned in the article, that haven't been able to pay because they can't find a job; either because they're too old, they have a disability, etc. I think the choice to not evict these people is the right one but at the same time, they should be trying to straighten things out.

    ReplyDelete
  32. I think this law was very neccessary to calm the people and to give them some hope to dont make this situation uncontrollable to the government. Evictions have caused a lot of problems on spanish society like suicides and this kind of stuff and it's a very serious problem because there are a lot of people in this situations who are really worried and helpless because they can't pay their bills.

    So, in conclusion, Spain is in a very bad situation and evictions is a very serious problem so laws like this should be able, at least, to give the people some chance to solve their problems.

    ReplyDelete
  33. In my opinion, this law will help a lot of people get back on track of their economic situation.It was the banks fault in the first place for giving out huge amounts of money that were almost impossible to pay back, so I believe that the banks should pay for it. What they should do is make more money and give it out to the people and everybody would be happy.

    ReplyDelete
  34. I think that this must to change. It can't be that! People are desperate... And why are the government doing? They give negociate bailouts with banks... And, whereas, people kill herself. Very good. I hope the eviction finished soon.

    ReplyDelete
  35. In my opinion Spain is becoming a country in which people aren't happy because of all the economic problems and the difficult situation they are living. The banks just think about themselves and instead of helping and letting people live in their houses and allowing them to pay bit by bit, they just kick them out of their houses causing deaths as people have killed themself while they were being evicted. So I think the goverment is not doing enough to solve the problem, they are just trying to make us believe they have done something.

    ReplyDelete
  36. It's outrageous! Did anyone realize that banks are private companies? We, the citizens with our taxes, are paying the economic benefit of the banks, which are evicting many families. At the end, I am not surprised that the government hasn't done anything yet, what do you expect from them? They are a bunch of thieves who are only interested in the benefit of rich people.

    ReplyDelete
  37. I think that the pressure who these people receive is the cause of his despair, and this law reassured the situation but won't make the problem go away. The changes have to be positive to improve, not to cover the damage already caused. So many laws that want to improve the situation,it doesn't matter because the result already is caused.

    ReplyDelete