Ten European cities have demanded more help from the EU in their battle against Airbnb and other holiday rental websites, which they argue are locking locals out of housing and changing the face of neighbourhoods.

In a joint letter, Amsterdam, Barcelona, ​​Berlin, Bordeaux, Brussels, Krakow, Munich, Paris, Valencia and Vienna said the “explosive growth” of global short-stay lettings platforms must be on the agenda of the next set of European commissioners.

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In April the advocate general of the European court of justice found in non-binding opinion that under EU law Airbnb should be considered a digital information provider rather than a traditional real estate agent.

That status, if confirmed by the court, would allow Airbnb and similar platforms to operate freely across the bloc and, crucially, relieve them of any responsibility to ensure that landlords comply with local rules aimed at regulating holiday lets.

“European cities believe homes should be used first and foremost for living in,” the cities said in a statement released by Amsterdam city council. “Many suffer from a serious housing shortage. Where homes can be rented out more lucratively to tourists, they vanish from the traditional housing market.”

The cities said local authorities must be able to counter the adverse effects of the boom in short-term holiday lets, such rising rents for full-time residents and the continuing “touristification” of neighbourhoods, by “introducing their own regulations depending on the local situation”.

“We believe cities are best placed to understand their residents’ needs,” they said. “They have always been allowed to regulate local activity through urban planning and housing rules. The advocate general seems to imply this will no longer be possible when it comes to internet giants.”

After several years of strong growth, Airbnb currently has more than 18,000 listings in Amsterdam and Barcelona, 22,000 in Berlin and nearly 60,000 in Paris. Data from the campaign group InsideAirbnb last year suggested that more than half were whole apartments or houses, and that even in cities where short-term lets were restricted by local authorities, up to 30% were available for three or more months a year.

Many cities say the short-term holiday lettings boom is contributing to soaring long-term rents, although speculation and poor social housing provision are also factors. Last year Palma de Mallorca voted to ban almost all listings after a 50% increase in tourist lets was followed by a 40% rise in residential rents.

Many are now trying to take action: in Paris, landlords face a fine if they fail to register with city hall before letting any property short-term (although many do not), while Amsterdam has tried to cut its annual limit for holiday lets to one month in 12, and last year Barcelona suspended all new short-term rental permits.

But city authorities now fear that the EU’s attempts to promote e-commerce and the “sharing economy” across the bloc are impeding their efforts to ensure that neighbourhoods remain both affordable and liveable for residents.

“The cities are not against this type of holiday rental,” they said. “Tourism provides a city with income and jobs. They do think they should be able to set rules.”

In particular, they are concerned about the implication in the advocate general’s opinion that the platforms are not obliged to share information about holiday lets that would make it much easier for cities to ensure local regulations are observed.

“We need strong legal obligations for platforms to cooperate with us in registration schemes and in supplying rental data for the properties on their platforms,” they said, adding that where platforms claimed they were willing to cooperate, “in practice they don’t, or only do so on a voluntary basis.”

Airbnb said in April it welcomed the advocate general’s opinion, which it said gave “a clear overview of what rules apply to collaborative economy platforms and how these rules help create opportunities for consumers”. It said it wanted to “continue working with everyone to put locals at the heart of sustainable 21st-century travel”.

Ian Brossat, Paris’s deputy mayor in charge of housing, said the situation had deteriorated to such an extent that “in the four central arrondissements of Paris, a quarter of all properties are now no longer homes but purely short-term rentals for tourists.”

Brossat said the city had put new rules in place and the number of Airbnb rentals had stabilised, but “now Airbnb is turning to the [European] commission and appealing to a law that is obviously extremely favourable to its activities. Our local rules are effectively threatened by the European commission.”

Digital multinationals could not be allowed to become “more powerful than cities, more powerful than states,” Brossat told French radio. “We need the European Union to be on the side of residents, not these big companies.”

Airbnb – a potted history

Airbnb began in 2007 as a loose “community” of amateur hosts offering spare rooms or temporarily vacant homes to travellers. It argues its commercial activities in matching property owners with people seeking accommodation online mean it is not a traditional lettings agency.

The company has had triple-digit growth in several European cities since 2014, the year the continent became its biggest market with more than half of total global stays. It now lists tens of thousands of addresses in popular tourist destinations such as London, Paris, Rome, Amsterdam, Berlin, Copenhagen and Madrid.

Campaigners and local authorities say say that since in many cities more than half of Airbnb listings are whole homes rather than spare rooms, many of them available for all or much of the year, the company is robbing full-time residents of homes, driving up rents and contributing to “overtourism”.

While some landlords are still private owners renting out a spare room, a significant number are large-scale commercial operators, often with multiple listings – and campaigners say Airbnb benefits unfairly from EU efforts to stimulate the “sharing economy” that mean it can effectively ignore local regulatory requirements.