E/C.12/75/D/226/2021
E/C.12/75/D/227/2021
collaboration were not taken into account in the decision to evict the authors. Moreover, the
eviction was the result not of a request by an individual who needed the housing as a home
or to provide vital income but of proceedings brought by the State railway company, which
had neglected the premises for several years.
10.4 The Committees notes that measures taken within the framework of an eviction must
be reasonable and appropriate in view of the interests at stake and the circumstances of the
persons affected.38
10.5 The Committee considers it relevant to state that, in the light of the specific
circumstances of the present cases, a proper proportionality test should have considered: the
weighing of the socioeconomic vulnerability of the authors and their families; the differential
impact of the eviction on the authors, as heads of households in a precarious economic
situation; the best interests of the children and their right to be heard; the authors’ previous
applications for social housing; the availability of social housing provided by the responsible
administrative authorities and the existence of alternative means of resolving the problem;
and the lengthy period of time for which they had resided in the houses. In order to assess the
authors’ situation, the authorities involved should have held a genuine and effective
consultation with them and should have requested the relevant administrative authorities to
provide information on the availability of social housing for the authors and their families.
10.6 The Committee is therefore of the view that the failure to carry out a sufficiently
comprehensive analysis of the proportionality of the eviction constituted a violation by the
State party of the authors’ right to housing under article 11 of the Covenant.
D.
Conclusion and recommendations
11.1 On the basis of all the information provided and in the particular circumstances of the
present cases, the Committee considers that the eviction of the authors and their families
without an adequate proportionality test by the judicial authorities, in the absence of a
consideration of the disproportionate impact that the eviction might have on the authors and
their families and of the best interests of the child, and without respecting the procedural
guarantees of adequate and genuine consultation, would constitute a violation of the authors’
right to adequate housing.
11.2 The Committee, acting under article 9 (1) of the Optional Protocol, is of the view that
the State party violated the authors’ right under article 11 (1) of the Covenant. In the light of
its Views in the present communications, the Committee makes the following
recommendations to the State party.
Recommendations in respect of the authors
12.
The State party is under an obligation to provide the authors with an effective remedy,
in particular by: (a) reassessing, if they are not currently in adequate housing, their state of
necessity and their place on the waiting list, taking into account the length of time that their
application for housing has been on file with the relevant authorities, starting from the date
on which they applied, with a view to providing them with public housing or taking some
other measure that would enable them to live in adequate housing, bearing in mind the criteria
set out in the present Views; (b) providing the authors with financial compensation for the
violations of their rights; and (c) reimbursing the authors for the legal costs reasonably
incurred in submitting the present communications, at both the domestic and the international
levels.
General recommendations
13.
The Committee considers that the remedies recommended in the context of individual
communications may include guarantees of non-repetition and recalls that the State party has
an obligation to prevent similar violations in the future. The State party should ensure that its
38
12
Ben Djazia et al. v. Spain, paras. 15.3 and 15.5.
GE.24-03814