Barbara Steenbergen is the Head of International Union of Tenants (IUT) EU liaison office, which she also established in 2008. She has been committed to tenant protection for more than 20 years, and is responsible for the political relations and representation of the interests of the European tenant associations towards the EU Commission, the EU Parliament and the EU Council.
She started in 2001 as head of the presidential office of the German Tenants’ Union Deutscher Mieterbund www.mieterbund.de in Berlin and as political coordinator for energy policy and international affairs. In 2007, the General Assembly of the International Union of Tenants (IUT) elected her as head of the newly founded IUT Liaison Office to the European Union in Brussels, which she established in 2008. Since 2013 Barbara Steenbergen has been a member of the Executive Board of the IUT. Since 2020 she is Vice chair of the tenants’ association of Bonn, Germany www.mieterbund-bonn.de. From 2009-2012 she chaired the European Housing Forum, the organisation of federations working in the field of housing represented in Brussels.
Since 2013 Barbara Steenbergen has been chair of the Stakeholder Forum of the European Responsible Housing Initiative and president of the jury of the European Responsible Housing Award, which is awarded every three years. https://www.responsiblehousing.eu/. Since 2016 she has been a member of the civil society liaison group to the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC).
In 2016 the EU Council appointed her as a member of the “EU Partnership for Affordable Housing” in the “Pact of Amsterdam”. https://futurium.ec.europa.eu/en/urban-agenda/housing/pages/members. This partnership consists of experts from cities, EU Member States, the European Commission, the European Investment Bank and the supply and demand side of the housing sector. It drafts catalogues of measures for the EU legislator. The main aim is to make more investment in affordable housing possible again. Barbara Steenbergen chairs the working group on housing policy there.
Barbara is a German citizen and holds a master’s degree in political science from the University of Bonn, Germany and a bachelor in public administration.
About IUT:
The International Union of Tenants was founded in Zürich, Switzerland in 1926. The IUT is headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden. The IUT office in Brussels, Belgium, manages the work with the European institutions. The IUT belongs to 72 tenant organisations in 47 countries worldwide. https://www.iut.nu/
Every first Monday in October, the IUT celebrates International Tenants’ Day/UN-World Habitat Day.