As safe as houses

MADRID mayor Manuela Carmena has vetoed mass social housing evictions.

Last year 220 tenants successfully thwarted the previous corporation’s plans to sell their homes to an investment fund which intended to charge astronomical rents.  Undeterred, the former mayor Ana Botella then decided to recover the homes by not renewing rent contracts and as a result, 70 tenants were immersed in eviction proceedings.  

These have been halted and none will be initiated against thousands of other tenants, Carmena pledged. That is what she was elected for – not erasing Salvador Dali’s name from a Madrid street because he painted Franco’s granddaughter.

Breaking out 

THE saying about lies, lies and damn statistics could be rephrased as lies, lies, and opinion polls.

So reading in the national Spanish press that six out of 10 Catalans regard independence as unfeasible is what you’d expect to read outside Catalunya where there is scant sympathy for independence.  It might not be accurate;  it could be way off-beam.  

But even if that were five out every 10 Catalans or 4.5, then Artur Mas will be having a very sticky summer of it and not only because of record humidity.

Staying put

FIFTY-FIVE per cent of Basques reject independence, a Metroscopia poll found, and two-thirds are happy as they are. This does not imply Mariano Rajoy should interpret this as approval of the Madrid government.  It merely means that, Basques are nationalists, not separatists.