Demos against housing shortage in Portugal - protest camps cleared

Portugal Demos against housing shortage - protest camps cleared As of: November 1st, 2026 • 10:46 a.m

Young people are currently taking to the streets in many European countries - including Portugal. The demonstrations there are primarily directed against the housing shortage. The police took tough action against a protest camp in Lisbon.

Yesterday there were demonstrations in Portugal against the housing shortage and a planned rent law. Early on Sunday morning, the police cleared a protest camp in the capital Lisbon.

Demonstrators had set up a camp with more than 50 tents in the central Rossio square. Police used batons and dogs to disperse the hundreds of protesters. A similar, smaller camp in the city of Porto was also broken up by police.

Protests in Portugal against planned rent law tagesschau24, November 1st, 2026 • 9:00 a.m. Housing crisis in Portugal The protests in Portugal are particularly directed against the plans of the center-right minority government to enable faster evictions from apartments and to suspend the rent cap for new contracts. The draft passed a first reading in parliament with the far-right Chega party abstaining.

There is a serious housing crisis in Portugal. Since 2017, property prices have more than doubled, and rents for new leases have risen almost as much. Young people are particularly affected by this.

There are currently large demonstrations and riots in many European countries - partly for similar reasons. more

Prime Minister Luís Montenegro ruled out withdrawing the law but said he was open to making changes before the final vote in the coming weeks. The leader of the opposition Socialist Party, José Luís Carneiro, called on the government to hold talks with the opposition and protesters.

The police had already come under criticism the previous week when they used batons to clear camps in the same squares and arrested numerous people.

After the failure of two rental decrees, the Spaniards take to the streets. Meanwhile, there is speculation about new elections. more

In many European countries, young people in particular are currently taking to the streets, including Spain, Italy, France and Belgium. In Germany, the group “Gen Z regulates” called for protests for the first time yesterday. What almost all demonstrations have in common is the demand for an affordable life.

As in Portugal, the housing shortage is also a dominant issue among the protesters in neighboring Spain.

This topic in the program: tagesschau24 | News | 11/01/2026 | 9:00 a.m