The right to housing played an important role in a lawsuit over evictions in the Tweebos neighborhood in Rotterdam.
The Tweebosbuurt is a neighborhood in the Afrikaanderwijk in Rotterdam-Zuid. It is a neighborhood with many social housing units. In September 2020, housing corporation Vestia informed residents that the neighborhood would be demolished. Most of the social rental housing will make way for more expensive housing, making it impossible for many of the residents to return to the neighborhood. According to Vestia, the demolition of the neighborhood fits within Rotterdam’s housing policy. This is shaped in the Housing Vision 2030.
The Woonvisie 2030 aims to change the “socioeconomic balance” in the city in favor of middle and higher income groups. Poor(er) people are thus less welcome in the city. Despite the national housing crisis, Rotterdam’s housing policy aims to reduce the stock of cheap housing. According to the Housing Vision, 13,500 affordable houses must be demolished by 2030. This policy may result in people with low incomes, including proportionately many people with a migration background, being forced to leave the city.
Some of the residents of the Tweebos neighborhood disagreed with the demolition of their homes, and refused to leave their homes. To enforce that, Vestia went to court. In January 2020, the Rotterdam subdistrict court ruled in part that the residents could not be evicted from their homes. In doing so, the judge explicitly referred to the fundamental right to housing, stating that Vestia had not shown that this right “is sufficiently guaranteed for all residents of the Tweebos neighborhood in particular and for all persons on a narrow budget in general.”
In April 2021, five UN Special Rapporteurs, including the UN Special Rapporteur on the right to housing, sent a highly critical letter to the municipality of Rotterdam. In this letter, the Rapporteurs express their concerns about an (imminent) violation of the right to housing and the right to non-discrimination by Rotterdam’s housing policy. The UN Special Rapporteurs also address the situation in the Tweebos neighborhood. Nevertheless, while no ruling had yet been rendered on appeal either, Vestia already began demolishing the vacant homes in the neighborhood.
Amicus Curiae by PILP
The case of the Tweebos neighborhood goes to the heart of the right to housing. According to PILP, it is therefore important that sufficient weight be given to this fundamental human right in the court cases concerning the evictions in the Tweebos neighborhood.
PILP has therefore written an amicus curiae (a kind of opinion letter) to the Court of Appeal of The Hague. In this letter, PILP explains what important elements of the right to housing are, and how these elements can be considered within the court case.
The court case about the evictions in the Tweebos neighborhood took place within the legal framework of rent law. According to PILP, the right to housing must play an important role in the balancing of interests that must take place according to tenancy law standards. On Nov. 23, 2021, the Court of Appeal of The Hague ruled in the last remaining Tweebosbuurt case of an 84-year-old resident. Unfortunately, the court did not want to include PILP’s human rights arguments in it. The court found that this last resident also had to leave his home in the neighborhood.
