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international

Socialist Party calls housing shortage ‘irresponsible’  

Joris Macklon,
17 augustus 2017 - 16:09

A faction of the Dutch Socialist Party (Socialistische Partij) has urged the Amsterdam city council to address the problem of student housing.

It is estimated that the city will need to provide 2,000 affordable rooms a year to meet the housing shortage, attributed to the steadily growing number of international applicants. Socialist Party member Erik Flentge describes the problem: ‘Landlords are exploiting what’s already a scarcity in affordable housing by raising their prices with the result that a large number of foreign students are unable to find a room. This is particularly problematic considering some of them don’t have relatives and friends here to fall back on.’

 

The party goes further to say the situation could have been prevented. ‘The careless handling of student registration has caused a disparity between the number of students and the number of rooms available.’

 

The faction has questioned whether the city council has the legal tools necessary to tackle what it describes as ‘exploitative’ increases in rent, and has urged it to start a dialogue with the city’s universities about whether  international students could be better spread across the country.

 

Research institution Nuffic has estimated the current number of international students living in The Netherlands to be around 112.000, a national record.