Plans to freeze rents in the social housing sector for two years are likely to run into trouble in the senate, where there is no majority in favour of the measure, the AD has reported.

Members of parliament voted last month to stop housing corporations increasing rents by 5% in July, despite opposition from housing minister Mona Keijzer. The freeze will not apply to private sector landlords because compensating them for lost income would be too complex, Keijzer has said.

Housing corporations have warned the freeze will hit their finances hard, even with the €1 billion in compensation that has been promised, and could put hundreds of new-build projects at risk. They have launched legal proceedings against the government.

Now it appears that the PvdA-GroenLinks alliance and other opposition parties in the upper house will not support the rent freeze either.

“It will lead to a construction halt at a time of a serious shortage of housing,” said MP Habtamu de Hoop. “Who on earth comes up with something like this?” The Socialist Party is also likely to say no, saying the plan has not been properly thought through, the AD said.

ChristenUnie, D66, the CDA and the SGP have presented an alternative plan to compensate low-income households for the rent increase by raising housing benefit.

The four-party right-wing coalition does not have a majority in the senate.