As soaring rents and house prices across Europe feed into the political discourse, campaigners believe they have a rare opportunity to force housing to the top of the agenda Don’t get This Is Europe delivered to your inbox? Sign up here It was billed as one of the largest real-estate events in Europe, attracting as many as 15,000 people ranging from investment firms to developers. But as the District trade show and summit got under way last week in Madrid, housing campaigners from 140 organisations across the globe turned up, intent on holding their own “counter-summit” to push back against the idea of housing as a financial asset. Many of the campaigners arrived in the Spanish capital as Maricarmen Abascal, an 87-year-old woman who uses a wheelchair, was being evicted from the apartment