Lisbon: The housing exclusion recommendation reaches EU employment and social ministers on 19 October 2026, when the Council is expected to adopt it in Luxembourg. The housing exclusion recommendation asks every member state to build a strategy against homelessness and housing exclusion, and it arrives five years after governments signed the Lisbon Declaration on combating homelessness. Ministers will also discuss the upcoming Quality Jobs Act and aim to approve conclusions on equality and economic growth.
The Commission proposed the housing exclusion recommendation on 6 May 2026 as part of its Anti-Poverty Strategy. A Council recommendation is not binding law, but it sets a common direction and obliges governments to report on progress. The proposal asks member states to adopt or revise strategic frameworks on housing exclusion and homelessness, to set objectives, and to collect regular and comparable statistics.
The objectives are specific. Every person sleeping rough should be offered emergency accommodation, and people in temporary accommodation should receive support to reach long-term housing. The text defines housing-led approaches and names Housing First as an example. It also asks governments to involve people with lived experience and civil society, and to arrange housing support for people who leave institutions such as hospitals or prisons.
Reporting follows a slow rhythm. Member states would report to the Commission every five years, which is the point where critics push hardest. The European homelessness federation FEANTSA welcomes the housing exclusion recommendation as proof that homelessness stays on the EU poverty agenda, but it wants a report every two years so that progress becomes visible within a single political term.
FEANTSA raises further objections that ministers may hear on 19 October. It argues that the emergency accommodation objectives resemble a staircase model, in which people must pass through shelters before they reach a home, and it calls that a step back from housing-led policy. It also wants a clear ban on criminalising homelessness, a broader definition that matches the ETHOS typology, and explicit references to reception centres for asylum applicants.
The federation notes a gap between the mandate and the result. The December 2025 presidency conclusions asked the Commission for a recommendation on ending homelessness, while the proposal covers housing exclusion in general. In its view, the housing exclusion recommendation only partly answers the Council’s own request, and it lacks concrete commitments on the Commission’s future work, including EU funds guidance and the European Semester.
Ministers face a practical choice. They can adopt the text as it stands and rely on national action plans to fill the gaps, or they can add language on prevention and monitoring before the vote. Either way, the housing exclusion recommendation will set the benchmark against which campaigners and governments measure progress on homelessness in 2026 and beyond.
