Working is not enough

For years, Cicsene, a non-profit organisation, has been working on the problem of access to housing, in particular for vulnerable groups, the so-called gray groups. Convinced that the problem of access to housing currently in Italy requires a series of complementary policies and initiatives, the organization works by encouraging the meeting between the offer (especially considering the high number of empty houses and accommodation) and the demand (in particular the most vulnerable segment of the population that risks slipping into poverty).

Precisely because it has its hands in the dough, Cicsene is asking itself questions about what is happening with the increase in mortgage costs and the repercussions on those who are no longer able to face their increased loan. With the consequence of having their accommodation requisitioned. The banks obviously justify themselves by the fact that they must maintain their returns in the face of a new policy towards them.

Those who are on the ground every day can only see that once again they are the last in the supply chain to pay. In this case the last in the supply chain who perhaps were not poor but risk ending up in poverty. The lack of any measure to protect them forces us to ask ourselves: what can we promote so as not to passively suffer the effects of the poverty factory?

The card. Matteo Zuppi, president of the Italian Episcopal Conference, recently stated "the six million Italians living in poverty are something that should shock us". We absolutely agree. So not only must we work to ensure that the poor are treated with dignity, but also to ensure that the system is not a harbinger of further poverty. Again the cardinal, on the occasion of the fortieth assembly of Italian Municipalities, declared on "what we can do together" and underlined the valorization of the daily assistance that municipal administrations and parishes provide to the weakest categories, from migrants to the disabled.

We are all aware, for example, of what is defined as "poor work". The data provided by Istat say that working is not enough to protect oneself from poverty.

14.7% of families where the reference person is a worker, i.e. one in seven, are poor and the incidence is higher among independent workers who are not entrepreneurs or freelancers.

So let's try to understand how we can help families not to lose the house they got into debt for. We try as third sector and civil society entities, as local communities, as public bodies, as parishes. But also as banks: in fact, profit does not exempt them from social responsibility, from operating with ethical and moral criteria.

Gianfranco Cattai

NP Novembre 2023