Illegal housing – is it acceptable?

An acute shortage of rental housing along with high rents has led to a sharp increase in the number of people living in illegal or informal housing in office or factory buildings outside residential areas. Studies have shown two main groups living under such conditions, foreign workers and Icelanders with low income or a marginal position on the labour market.

On Friday November 17th at 1 pm, The Reykjavík Academy and the City of Reykjavík stage a conference at the Nordic House aiming to highlight and analyse these problems.

The conference is an important milestone of a larger research project focusing on this serious social problem scenario. In this work the Reykjavík Academy cooperates with the Reykjavík Area Fire Brigade, Statistics Iceland, Registers Iceland, Iceland Directorate of Labour, The Icelandic Confederate of Labour (ASÍ), The Federation of General and Special Workers (SGS), Retor Language School an many others.

Keynote speaker at the conference is Gillian Young, Director of Newhaven Research Scotland and Honorary Research Fellow at Heriot Watt University. Gillian is an experienced housing researcher, her fields of work include immigrant housing, housing health and well being linkages, social renting and welfare reform.

Conference moderator: Linda Blöndal, Television journalist.

Program:
13:00 Setningarorð – Dagur B. Eggertsson, borgarstjóri
Verkafólk og húsnæði á tímum alþjóðavæðingar
13:10 Local accommodation: migration and the shaping of local housing systems
Gillian Young, forstöðukona Newhaven Research í Skotlandi og rannsóknaprófessor við Heriot Watt háskólann.
13:45 Alþjóðavæðingin og verkafólk
Drífa Snædal, framkvæmdastjóri Starfsgreinasambands Íslands
14:05 Húsnæðisaðstæður innflytjenda á Íslandi – niðurstöður rýnihópaviðtala
Guðbjörg Ottósdóttir, lektor í félagsráðgjöf við Háskóla Íslands
Búseta í ólöglegu húsnæði á Íslandi
14:25 Greining gagna um óleyfisbúsetu á Íslandi
Jón Rúnar Sveinsson, félagsfræðingur og Svandís Nína Jónsdóttir, gagnasérfræðingur og framkvæmdastjóri ReykjavíkurAkademíunnar

15:00 Pause

15:20 Óleyfisíbúðir, staðan nú og leiðir til aukins öryggis
Jón Viðar Matthíasson, slökkviliðsstjóri SHS
15:40 Búseta í óhefðbundnu húsnæði í Reykjavík á grundvelli manntalsins 2011
Ómar Harðarson, fagstjóri hjá Hagstofu Íslands
16:00 Erlent vinnuafl á vinnumarkaði – hlutverk Vinnumálastofnunar, áskoranir og sóknarfæri
Unnur Sverrisdóttir, aðstoðarframkvæmdastjóri Vinnumálastofnunar
16:20 Kjör erlendra verkamanna og starfsmannaleigur
Halldór Grönvold, aðstoðarframkvæmdastjóri ASÍ
16:25 Umræður
17:00 Dagskrárlok