• The deputies are examining this week a bill brought by the presidential majority to toughen the penalties incurred by squatters and shorten the deadlines for rental evictions in the event of non-payment.

  • The text should receive the support of the Republicans and the National Rally, who have already adopted it in the law commission, during which the deputy LR Annie Genevard had an amendment adopted to "liken the squat to a theft".

  • But the rebellious, the communists and the ecologists, as well as associations like DAL, Attac, the Abbé Pierre Foundation or the Secours Catholique, are upwind against this text which "criminalizes the precarious".

Will the deputies still send each other bird names?

After the bullfighting episodes and especially the “Are you going to shut it up?

» from the end of last week, the National Assembly could again be white-hot with the examination of the anti-squat bill, carried by the groups of the presidential majority Renaissance and Horizons.

The left and defense associations are up against this text adopted Wednesday in the Economic Affairs Committee.

What does the law currently say?

After the high-profile cases of Théoule-sur-Mer, in August 2020, Parliament voted in October 2020 a text which simplifies and accelerates the eviction of squatters, without going through a legal action, which can take months or even years. years.

Since then, if an owner discovers that his accommodation is illegally occupied, he warns the police and can seize the prefect.

The latter then has 48 hours to respond and give notice to the squatters to leave the premises.

The procedure concerns any secondary residence, pied-à-terre, etc., but not the illegal occupation of bare land, sheds, or buildings in ruins, which are still subject to legal proceedings.

In 2021, 170 requests for intervention were made to the prefects to request an eviction within 48 hours in this context.

The original text also provided for tripling the penalties incurred, up to three years in prison and a fine of 45,000 euros.

But this part was challenged by the Constitutional Council, which saw it as a "legislative horseman".

The text was indeed integrated into the law of Acceleration and simplification of public action (ASAP).

However, for the Elders of rue Montpensier, a modification of the Penal Code had nothing to do with this law.

“We are waiting for another legislative vehicle which will allow us to reintroduce the hardening of sanctions”, announced the deputy LREM Guillaume Kasbarian, rapporteur for the law.

What does the law discussed this week in the Assembly provide?

Same subject, same reporter.

Guillaume Kasbarian is once again in charge.

And the deputy of Eure-et-Loir and chairman of the Economic Affairs Committee intends, this time, to pass the tripling of the penalties incurred.

“Currently a squatter risks one year in prison and a fine of 15,000 euros.

But the owner who changes the lock risks three years and 45,000 euros, ”he denounces.

His bill provides in return the same penalty for those who pretend to be an owner in order to rent a property.

The text also extends the express eviction procedure to vacant accommodation, including empty of furniture.

The bill also aims to review the mechanisms for evicting tenants who do not pay their rent.

“We want to make these procedures more efficient, a little shorter, so that small owners do not find themselves bogged down in procedures for three, four, five years and find themselves in a situation of precariousness, ”said Guillaume Kasbarian on France Info.

The text thus reduces the duration of the legal proceedings, and provides that certain time limits that may be granted by a judge are now only possible if the tenant makes the request himself.

“A manifest attack on the office of the eviction judge”, denounces the left, which fears a lack of recourse for tenants.

The bill also aims to comfort lessors in the face of unpaid bills,

Why is the text arousing controversy?

The presidential camp will be able to count on the votes of the right to have the text adopted.

"We have been making proposals in this direction for a long time," said MP Annie Genevard (LR).

In committee, she had an amendment adopted to "liken squatting to theft", an "essential" provision that she hopes to extend to cases of occupation of premises for economic use.

The RN group also approved this text in committee.

As for the government, if it has supported the text, it could still weigh in on the session to balance it.

“We should not react in the same way against squats, in particular those maintained by slumlords, as in front of unpaid tenants”, warned the Minister of Housing, Olivier Klein.

The rebellious deputies, communists and ecologists are for their part fiercely opposed to this text.

"This law is a homeless factory", denounces LFI MP Danielle Simonnet, whose group intends to file a motion of rejection prior to the text.

“It is a particularly dangerous law (…) which wants to criminalize unpaid rent”, also denounces the ecologist Aurélien Taché, affirming that certain provisions would have led to “criminalize the actions” of the Black Thursday collective.



While the Right to Housing association organizes rallies against this law, Attac denounces a law which “criminalizes the precarious”.

"This text will allow evictions in forty-eight hours, without a judge, of squatters who occupy vacant housing," fears Manuel Domergue (Abbé Pierre Foundation).

"In addition to being unfair, the bill is useless and dangerous, because it dramatizes a phenomenon which is in reality marginal", adds Ninon Overhoff, head of the "From the street to housing" department of Secours Catholique.

The FNAIM, which represents real estate professionals, welcomes on the other hand a “start of rebalancing of rights”.

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  • Company

  • squats

  • National Assembly

  • Renaissance (Political Party)

  • Law