Building amnesty on the way: it will affect 80 per cent of homes. Meloni: 'I don't know the rule'

The ministry of Infrastructures and Transport is preparing a package of regulations to intervene on housing, as also requested and desired by territorial administrations, associations and bodies in the building sector. This was announced by the ministry headed by Matteo Salvini, explaining that it is a series of measures aimed at regularising minor discrepancies or structural irregularities that affect, according to a study by the National Council of Engineers, almost 80% of Italy's real estate stock. The announcement immediately triggered political reactions from the opposition.

Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni greeted the government ally's move with coldness: "Salvini hinted at something to me some time ago, then I saw that today he reiterated that he is working on this rule but I don't know it, I am not in a position to pass judgement. I read the communiqué of the Ministry of Transport that talks about sanctioning small internal discrepancies,' said the premier, host of 'Porta a Porta', 'that is, if you have raised a partition to make two rooms where there was one. If that's what it is let's talk about it, it's reasonable, but I cannot reasonably comment on a regulation that I have not read'.

The Ministry's note specifies: discrepancies of a formal nature, linked to uncertainties in the interpretation of the regulations in force; 'internal' building discrepancies, concerning individual property units, to which the owners have made minor changes (partitions, mezzanines, etc.); discrepancies that could be remedied at the time the work was carried out, but cannot be remedied today due to the 'double compliance' regulations, which do not allow for the obtainment of a permit or report in amnesty for a large number of works dating back in time. And also to allow changes of use of buildings between homogeneous categories.

These guidelines," the ministry explains, "on which the offices have been working, also following the proposals gathered in previous meetings on the subject, and which have led to the draft legislation, were presented during the meeting on the housing plan, held at the MIT in the presence of the deputy prime minister and minister Matteo Salvini with the Dipe (department for planning and coordination of economic policy) and about 50 institutions, bodies, associations, professional orders and foundations in the sector. The rationale,' it is explained, 'is to protect small property owners who in many cases have been waiting for decades for their positions to be regularised and who are often unable to renovate or sell their homes. At the same time, it deflates the work of municipal technical offices, which are often overwhelmed by applications for amnesties. In the light of administrative simplification and efficiency, it was also planned to intervene on administrative procedures to guarantee citizens certain answers in certain timeframes.

"This is not an amnesty, the measure aims to resolve small discrepancies of a formal nature inside the houses, pre-1977 discrepancies, these are absolutely minimal things inside the dwellings," emphasised Ance vice-president Stefano Betti, commenting on the package of house-saving regulations that the ministry is preparing. "It is an interesting measure in the short term, but it is a drop in the ocean compared to the solutions that need to be found in the medium and long term," Betti explained, emphasising that first of all it is necessary to "review" both the Consolidated Law on Construction and the National Urban Planning Law, tools that are now "old" and "not adequate" to work within the framework of "urban regeneration".