Social housing: employees who go to work on foot or by bike will soon be given priority for obtaining HLM?

In a bill recently tabled in the National Assembly, MP Jean-Luc Warsmann suggests that “the immediate proximity (of the HLM) to the workplace of a family member be a priority criterion for the allocation of social housing.

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It is an understatement to say that the competition is tough to obtain HLM. No less than 2.7 million people are waiting for social housing, or 100,000 more than a year ago, according to the Social Union for Housing. In a bill registered at the presidency of the National Assembly on September 17, the MP for the Ardennes Jean-Luc Warsmann (Freedoms, Independents, Overseas and Territories) suggests that “the immediate proximity (of the HLM) to the workplace of a family member is a priority criterion for the allocation of social housing”. An immediate proximity that Jean-Luc Warsmann defines by the possibility of going to work “on foot or by bike, or by a distance of less than one kilometer between home and work”.

“Currently, proximity to the workplace is only one element within a set of criteria for awarding social housing”he regrets. The 2022 decentralization law, however, set quantified objectives for the allocation of social housing to so-called essential workers, operating in health, security and even food. But Jean-Luc Warsmann wants to go further.

A financial gain coupled with an ecological asset

“In areas where public transport is limited”and the deputy for the Ardennes speaks with full knowledge of the facts, “the ability, for one member of a family, to go to work on foot or by bike represents a great asset for its purchasing powerto the extent that he no longer needs a vehicle”he argues.

“In many jurisdictions, a couple needs two cars to get to work. My objective, with this bill, is that one of the members of the couple no longer needs their car to go to work.explains the parliamentarian to Capital. He also sees his text as an asset for companies established in reindustrializing territories, which struggle to recruit due to lack of accommodation. Without forgetting the environmental benefit of replacing a car with a bicycle.

A risk of discrimination from other HLM applicants?

But aren’t the future government and HLM organizations likely to object to Jean-Luc Warsmann that he would thus favor the allocation of HLM to employees rather than to people most in need ? While preparing for the HLM Congress, which will take place at the end of September, the Social Union for Housing, which represents social landlords, did not wish to “follow through” at the request of Capital.

“There is an entire France that works but has seen its purchasing power decrease” in recent years, due to high inflation, recalls Jean-Luc Warsmann. “These employees have the right to be housed in the immediate vicinity of their place of work”he insists. The MP says to himself “in the starting blocks” to have this bill examined during the parliamentary “niches” (slots) reserved for each political group in the National Assembly. Jean-Luc Warsmann is also ready to transform its text into an amendment to a bill which would soon be examined by Parliament, if that turns out to be quicker. For example, the bill on affordable housing, carried by the former Minister of Housing Guillaume Kasbarian, which has not yet been able to be debated in the Senate, due to the dissolution of the National Assembly.