Editorial:
The elections showed that Spain is still in a crisis, perhaps less of a financial nature, as things slowly mend themselves, but certainly a political one. The Partido Popular lost badly, having largely failed to bring wealth back to the middle classes (give them more time) while the issue of endemic institutional corruption is now beginning to bite deep. The new parties, particularly Podemos, are strident for change, knowing they have little time before they will themselves become mainstream and must begin to fade. The elections are far from over in this troubled country, with Catalonia going to the polls in late September and, in the closing weeks of the year, date still unannounced, the General Elections loom. For the foreign residents who live here (and who often don't vote) there are now no more political decisions for them to participate in, beyond that inspired sprinkle of foreign councillors who must now begin to see to their duties in their town halls...
Housing:
'It's no secret that the euro has been a little downtrodden by sterling since the beginning of the year. With the additional impact of 200,000 more British investors eyeing up the market since changes to regulations came into force in April, Spain is very much an investors market! The latest Spanish Property Market Confidence Index (SPMCI) from Spain's major property portal Kyero reveals that around 71% of agents in the country have more confidence in the property market in Q1 2015 compared to a year earlier...'. Article from Property Showrooms.
'Foreign buyers were involved in 11,045 Spanish home sales registered in the Property Register in the first three months of the year, reveals the latest report from the Property Registrars. Foreign demand was up 10 per cent compared to the same time last year. As usual, the British were the biggest group with 18 per cent foreign market share, followed by the French with 10 per cent, and Germany on 8 per cent...'. From Mark Stüklin's Spanish Property Insight.
Tourism:
Electoral results from Spain's fifty leading resorts, from Preferente. The article begins: 'PP performs badly across almost all the resorts...'.
Finance:
Headline from El País in English: 'Inequality between rich and poor has hit record highs, OECD warns. In Spain, 18% of the population lives below poverty line, twice as many as before the crisis'. El Mundo notes that the number of children under the poverty line in Spain is rising and now stands at 29.6%.
A headline from Wolf Street: 'Downturn in South America Mauls Spanish Companies, Threatens Spain’s “Recovery”'.
Politics:
'So, has there been an earthquake in Spanish politics after Sunday’s local and regional elections as many had expected? The short answer is no. The two establishment parties, the ruling conservative People’s party and the opposition Socialists, have seen their long-time hegemony further eroded, but together they still hold more than 50% of the vote...'. Election analysis from The Guardian. A more radical view comes from El Espía en el Congreso, which attacks the PP: 'They lost another 2.5 million votes, the absolute majorities in all the autonomies, the eight Andalucian capitals and cities as important as Madrid and Valencia. They stand alone, because no one will pact with the 'party of corruption'...'.
The full results for both autonomic and local elections, broken down, are here.
The foreign press say 'the indignant ones take Spain'. La Información checks out the newspapers and magazines from Europe and beyond.
Most of the interesting results are recorded here at El Mundo. There's another interactive map as well. What happens if there's a tie in the number of votes (it happened in a town in Almería)? They decide on the toss of a coin. In the Town Halls, a mayor must be chosen by the councillors by June 13th. If not, then the 'most voted' list will win. In the Autonomies, if there is no solution (we have been watching the problems in Andalucía) then fresh elections will be called (except, for some reason, in Castilla – La Mancha where, after two months, the largest party will govern).
Several leading Partido Popular 'barons' are winding down their careers following the election results. These include Albert Fabra (Valencia), José Ramón Bauzá (Balearics) with María Dolores de Cospedal (Castilla-La Mancha), Juan Vicente Herrera (Castilla y León) and Luisa Fernanda Rudi (Aragon) also planning an end to their respective presidencies. El País has the story. As for Esperanza Aguirre, President of the Madrid PP and would-be mayoress of that city, she says she won't resign following the disastrous results. Now she has an uphill and likely impossible job of taking the capital city. According to Bolsamanía, neither Rajoy nor Cospedal would be sorry to see her go. The PP lost 513 absolute majorities across Spain. El Mundo suggests that even Mariano Rajoy may not make it to the autumn/winter elections as candidate for the Partido Popular. The results could have been worse for the PP, but few Spaniards working abroad (thanks, generally speaking, to the 'crisis' here) were able to vote for bureaucratic reasons. Surprisingly, the Foreign Minister (who one of our readers calls 'Motor-mouth') Margallo has admitted blame for this here.
The Huff Post has an editorial about Spain's results, written by their editorial director in Spain Montserrat Domínguez: 'Letter from Spain: The Times Are A-Changing'. An excerpt: '...Her name is Ada Colau, and she has dedicated her life to social and political activism. This Sunday, the polls have turned her into the leader of the most voted for force in Barcelona. In short, if she is able to weave together the necessary agreements, she will be the first female mayor of the city. She is the first "indignada" that clearly unseats the power of traditional parties in Spain. But she is not alone: in Madrid, another woman, a 71-year-old ex-judge could become mayor, ousting the People's Party that had been unbeatable in the capital for more than 20 years: Manuela Carmena...'.
Ciudadanos did well, and is now the third municipal power in Spain, says La Información here.
'And then there were four. Politics is fracturing all over Europe, but nowhere so dramatically as in Spain'. Essay at The Economist (article from before the Sunday elections).
Meanwhile, PP pacts with the PSOE now seem the way forward. Good news for Susana Díaz in Andalucía?
Rosa Díez from the UpyD has throw in the towel, and won't continue as head of the fringe party. Item at Europa Press.
From Reuters: 'Catalonia separatists pin hopes on September vote after setback'. (A fresh worry for Rajoy).
The candidate for Ciudadanos in Nijar, Almería (he won few votes and won't be a councillor), was in the news for renting out plastic greenhouse space to immigrants for thirty euros per month each. Juan Jesús Martínez sees himself as 'a humanitarian, they should give me a prize for finding them a place to sleep...'. Inspectors say the lodgings were filthy and repulsive.
From The Olive Press: 'A key ex-pat property campaigner has won a seat in Albox’s local elections. AUAN president Maura Hillen will be part of the town hall after a dominant result for the PSOE who claimed the necessary nine seats...'. Maura is Nº 2 on the PSOE list for the Almería town and she hopes that the party from their stronghold in Seville will ease the problems of the foreign-owned homes under threat of demolition in Andalucía.
'For the first time ever, Manilva (Málaga) has a foreign resident in the town hall. British expat Dean Tyler Shelton is ‘over the moon’ after he was voted in as councillor in the May 24 local elections...'. From The Olive Press. A number of other ex-pats have seats in various councils across Spain, with several in Almería towns, including Mojácar, Bédar, Zurgena and Albox (others?). By and large as usual, the foreign residents didn't vote...
The apparently corrupt Alfonso Rus is ejected from the town hall of Xàtiva to music...
How many Spaniards have 'abandoned Spain' for jobs abroad? Pedro Sánchez (PSOE) says 500,000 since 2012, and Mariano Rajoy says there were just 24,000. As usual with numbers, there aren't any credible ones...
Valencia:
The recent autonomous elections in the Valencian Community were a disaster waiting to happen for the ruling Partido Popular, as the party and its senior representatives had been racked with corruption charges. In almost every instant the ultimate outcome in many locations will be the result of talks between the various political parties. In the three capital cities of the autonomy, the PP Mayors lost, and this was particularly hard for Rita Barberá who had governed Valencia fairly and enthusiastically for the last 24 years. The PP was also ejected from the Mayoral seats of Alicante and Castellón de la Plana, as well as the Presidency of the Autonomy with Alberto Fabra witnessing the worst result that the Community had seen for a long number of years. In all likelihood, the new President will either be Ximo Puig for the Socialists or Monica Oltra for Compromis. They will both be summoned by Mr Fabra in an effort to try and smooth out a way forward by some sort of political alliance. In fact, things are so bad for the PP in the autonomy, that you can count on your fingers the municipalities where the PP was not wiped off the map. (These incidentally include Benidorm, Benisano and Teulada). These results clearly pointed out to the politicians that the voters think that it is about time something was done to shake them up. The result could also be said to be the direct result of what happened over the Gürtel case in the Valencian Community that has now led to at least two former councillors being put in jail, as well as one former head of Castellón. In addition, the mess the PP was in internally made it almost impossible for the party to have any credibility any more. Caught in the crossfire of all this was Mrs Barberá, who suffered electorally as a result. (Thanks to Peter Gooch. his site is Valencia Life).
Brexit:
What Britain in the EU means to us: five leading European writers on the threat of 'Brexit' (the looming referendum on the UK staying with or leaving the EU). Article at The Guardian.
A Facebook page to join if you are concerned: UK Citizens in the EU: Say Yes.
From the ElCano Royal Institute: 'A united Europe is closer than you think'. An excerpt: 'There is a strong consensus on the euro-zone crisis among economists and political analysts both in Europe and the United States: for the euro-zone to endure, it would need to develop into a fiscal union and, consequently, a political one. In the same breath, however, influential commentators argue that this is politically infeasible in the current context of a heightened North-South divide within Europe. And there seems to be a strong consensus among pundits that political union in Europe is a pipe dream...'.
Courts:
One must spare a thought for Rodrigo Rato, the ex-Vice president of Spain, Finance Minister and head of Bankia who must now pay 18 million euros to unblock his numerous bank accounts, deposits and portfolios. El Huff Post reports.
'Spain's Constitutional Court on Tuesday struck down a regional law which blocked banks from repossessing homes from the most needy families for up to three years. The court ruled in favour of an appeal by Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy's conservative government, which argued that the law passed by the left-wing regional government of Andalucía interfered with powers allotted by the constitution to the central government...'. From Expatica.
Various:
'Chaos for holidaymakers after four partial strikes were announced today by the Spanish union of air traffic controllers. The strikes will happen on the 8, 10, 12 & 14th of June...'. Story at David Jackson.
The PP mayor of Chercos, Almería, returned to power without incident this Sunday. He will be 95 years old when they call the next local elections in 2019...
'Only one Spaniard may have made it onto the list of Forbes 100 most powerful women, but there are many more Spanish women who are masters in their fields. Here is The Local's top ten of the most influential'.
From the New York Times: 'Sephardic Jews Feel Bigotry’s Sting in Turkey and a Pull Back to Spain'. An excerpt: '...Over the past decade, under the government of the Islamist-rooted Justice and Development Party, and pressured by a string of deadly terrorist attacks on synagogues and a surge in anti-Semitism, the Jewish population — the vast majority of whom are Sephardic — has shrunk to 17,000 from 19,500 in 2005, according to figures obtained from the chief rabbinate in Istanbul...'.
The main Spanish dailies continue to lose audience. See the latest OJD figures and comparisons, here.
Get stories in advance (and some interesting pictures) on BoT's Facebook Page here.
See Spain:
The eighth Wonder of the World is El Escorial (according to this article). Some history and photos.
Eye on Spain writes of Sanlúcar de Barrameda, El Puerto de Santa María and Jerez de la Frontera, in 'Cathedrals of Wine', here.
An Update of Consumer Prices
by Andrew Brociner
We have looked at different aspects of the housing market in recent issues and have seen that there is a lack of demand coming from different factors which is reflected in the lack of price movement. In this issue, we take a look at the more general situation of consumer prices.
Spain is experiencing a period of declining prices, as can be seen in the graph below.
Consumer price inflation has registered negative values every month for almost a full year now. To the extent that deflation works its way into the system is a cause for concern, as over time, people will come to expect lower prices and will postpone purchases thereby taking advantage of lower prices in the future. This effect is no different in the housing market where we can consider that the continual decline in prices is reflected in the lack of demand. People put off buying until they see prices stabilise. In fact, the housing sector presents a good example of how demand is postponed during a prolonged period of declining prices.
As far as the general price index is concerned, it is not yet the case that people have come to expect lower prices and are putting off purchases. For the time being, they see it as being temporary and are rather taking advantage of lower prices, which can be seen by the rise in consumption recently. But, over time, as in the housing market, this effect could take place and the recent data is confirming this declining trend, so we will just have to see how things unfold.
Letters
Dear Lenox,
We live in Lliber, a small village in the Marina Alta of Alicante province. If you examine its padrón municipal (here) you will find that registered in the padrón are 1,080 people, of whom 316 are born in Spain. The rest are guiris.
Now we have found that if you are a guiri living in Spain, unless you want to spend all your spare time and all your spare cash, it is best to keep a very low profile. Fight if you have to (and we have fought on occasion) but keep a low profile if the end result isn't worth it. It usually isn't.
So, over the past three elections, we have found an official letter to a woman who stayed with us for a year about 12 years ago, and who registered in the padrón, inviting her to cast her vote in the coming elections. She left at the end of that year, but the invitations came shortly before each election. We, who have lived in Lliber for about 30 years, didn't receive the official letter, although we do get missives reminding us to pay municipal taxes for our house and our cars. In fact we don't mind not getting these missives, since our attitude is "Don't vote, it only encourages them". Perhaps not very responsible, but we are more than somewhat cynical.
Now what intrigues me is that in the analysis of the elections (here), the total numbers of votes cast were all of 395 (not very impressive in a representative democracy) but: this was reckoned to be 55.79% of all the possible voters.
Now if you get out your pocket calculator (as I did), you will find that this means that 100% of all possible voters (according to the data sheet) comes to 708 people.
Yet there are 1,080 people on the padrón of whom only 112 were below voting age. Since most of the guiris are retired people from all over Europe, it stands to reason that most of the people under age were Spanish. 1080 minus 112 leaves 968.
So, taking the fact that of the 968 people on the padrón, only 708 people apparently were given the opportunity to vote, and taking the fact that we don't get an invite to come and vote, I am beginning to smell a small (or perhaps not so small) rat inching its way into my awareness.
Perhaps you would like to make a similar examination of events in Mojácar?
Jan.
In Mojácar, the current PP mayoress saw off the five other parties with another absolute majority. Many of the foreign voters who voted (about 20% of the foreign residents), inexplicably supported her. Suspicion nevertheless lies on the postal votes, which were once again high at 16% (it should be about 2%) and the first five hundred votes out of the ballot box mostly going to her party. Still, despite protests to the Courts, it's all over now... Lenox
Finally:
The ghastly Eurovision is over for another year. Here are all of Spain's songs since 1961.
Si (
No(
