# Spain's Problems..



## mrypg9 (Apr 26, 2008)

As I've been sounding off about the Spanish political scene I thought I should make sure that I knew at least un pocito of what I was going on about so did some research.
One piece I read put Spain's ongoing structural problems down to waste and duplication and lack of Government control over regional spending. Apparently central government controls less than 50% of total spending.
Regionalism, according to this piece (from an archived edition of 'The Economist') has led to sixteen Parliaments, uncoordinated health systems where it is allegedly easier for a foreigner to get medical treatment in Andalucia than a native of Catalunya and wasteful duplication of police forces, with towns and some of the regions having their own police forces and the existence of two national police forces.
I have also discovered that both PP (Aznar's rule) and PSOE (Zapatero) were responsible for the construction bubble...Aznar because of the Land Act of 1998 but this liberalisation of land use policy was encouraged by Zapatero under whose rule bank credit to the private sector soared - this caused the current account deficit to soar from 27 bn euros to over 100 bn euros in his time as PM. Most of this credit came from foreign loans.
So PP gave Spain a casino economy...and PSOE did nothing to correct it.
All this reading is very depressing. I remember when I lived in London and was active in the Labour Party we often had Government Ministers speaking at our meetings. Very often it struck me that these powerful people weren't really that much cleverer than me or my next-door neighbour.
A truly terrifying discovery.
Now...which UK Government Minister holds the nuclear black box??????


----------



## VFR (Dec 23, 2009)

Yes Mary you are right about the health issue, as we spent three months on the CDS carrying out Valencian health cards & on visiting the doctors we just recived blank looks to be told that these are no good ?


----------



## VFR (Dec 23, 2009)

Yes Mary you are right about the health issue, as we spent three months on the CDS carrying out Valencian health cards & on visiting the doctors we just received blank looks to be told that these are no good ?

Ermm they are Spanish cards & on the card is my SS number that is the same throughout Spain ...... still no good as we will only recognise them with a EHIC issued by Valencia.

What a crazy system.



New party is elected so they promptly cancel all projects that have been started by the opposition regardless if they are needed/funds have been spent/will likely increase the areas fortunes.


----------



## Pesky Wesky (May 10, 2009)

And as usual I'm going to point out the idiosyncracies of the education system which for some reason includes state schools, private schools and inbetweeny (concertados) schools that are funded in part by the state and in part by the parents. In Madrid, as the president of the communidad (PP) likes the idea, she's building concertados like mad instead of building state schools.


----------



## thrax (Nov 13, 2008)

mrypg9 said:


> I remember when I lived in London and was active in the Labour Party we often had Government Ministers speaking at our meetings. Very often it struck me that these powerful people weren't really that much cleverer than me or my next-door neighbour.
> A truly terrifying discovery.
> Now...which UK Government Minister holds the nuclear black box??????


But isn't this a universal law? You want to be in politics, have a frontal lobotomy. I was a senior Civil Servant for far too many years and often met with and discussed issues with ministers and all I can say is that Yes Minister and Yes Prime Minister were not so far from the truth... (The writers actually based it on a Department on the floor below my first wife's office - the Department of Stealth and Total Obscurity as it was affectionally known back then)


----------



## mrypg9 (Apr 26, 2008)

thrax said:


> But isn't this a universal law? You want to be in politics, have a frontal lobotomy. I was a senior Civil Servant for far too many years and often met with and discussed issues with ministers and all I can say is that Yes Minister and Yes Prime Minister were not so far from the truth... (The writers actually based it on a Department on the floor below my first wife's office - the Department of Stealth and Total Obscurity as it was affectionally known back then)


I think it is. After thirty years working my t*ts off for the Labour Party I was expelled because I wouldn't toe the Party Line on........local government reform. I sincerely believed that the Party policy would be disastrous for the Council where I was Group Leader. History proved me right (says she smugly).
So I kept most of my functioning brain cells.
I still have a kind of gut affinity to any major social democratic Party capable of winning power but now I don't do anything for my Union apart from do the odd Seminar or Conference I enjoy taking the long, historical view.

When you were a Civil Servant did you come across a guy called Roland Zoelner? He was active in the First Division Association which you will know (but others might not) is the Union for senior Civil Servants.
We sat on TUC Committees together and he used to tell me tales that made my hair stand on end.


----------



## thelastspud (Oct 24, 2011)

This is a funny little video about the housing boom and bust 




Españistán by Aleix Saló (with English subtitles/subtitulado al inglés)


----------



## thrax (Nov 13, 2008)

mrypg9 said:


> I think it is. After thirty years working my t*ts off for the Labour Party I was expelled because I wouldn't toe the Party Line on........local government reform. I sincerely believed that the Party policy would be disastrous for the Council where I was Group Leader. History proved me right (says she smugly).
> So I kept most of my functioning brain cells.
> I still have a kind of gut affinity to any major social democratic Party capable of winning power but now I don't do anything for my Union apart from do the odd Seminar or Conference I enjoy taking the long, historical view.
> 
> ...


Yes I think I remember the name but I never met him. I was pretty a-political in those days so I'm afraid I didn't do much with the union (in terms of me) but I did, of course, have many discussions with them on staff issues.


----------



## Pesky Wesky (May 10, 2009)

thelastspud said:


> This is a funny little video about the housing boom and bust
> Españistán by Aleix Saló (with English subtitles/subtitulado al inglés) - YouTube
> Españistán by Aleix Saló (with English subtitles/subtitulado al inglés)


Yes, this was posted shortly after it came out.
I thought it was a pretty good summary of what happened.


----------



## mrypg9 (Apr 26, 2008)

Pesky Wesky said:


> And as usual I'm going to point out the idiosyncracies of the education system which for some reason includes state schools, private schools and inbetweeny (concertados) schools that are funded in part by the state and in part by the parents. In Madrid, as the president of the communidad (PP) likes the idea, she's building concertados like mad instead of building state schools.



We are experiencing the same in the UK. It's another example of neo-con ideas spreading from the US.
Charter schools, known as Academies in the UK, are hybrids run 'privately' on the back of taxpayers' money. They are state schools that have independence from local authorities and can be taken over by business or religious groups. We also have 'free schools' which can be started by any group, parents or religious organisations,again publicly funded.
I have mixed views about them. They certainly seem to raise standards in areas which are disadvantaged in socio-economic terms. I was reading about a primary school in a very deprived multi-ethnic London borough which became an Academy under the leadership of an inspired Head Teacher who took the school from being an OFSTED failure to achieving results in the top 2% of primary schools in a couple of years.
He did this by first teaching the pupils how to learn: simple things like sitting still, listening, concentrating....he had a few non-negotiable rules and pupils who broke them were asked to consider what other choices they could have made.
Simple but obvious stuff, all too often neglected or ignored by trendy education-as-social-engineering enthusiasts.
You can't teach without order and discipline but if you find those two concepts 'authoritarian' or even 'fascist' you will achieve no education worthy of the name.


----------



## eric cooper (May 18, 2010)

mrypg9 said:


> As I've been sounding off about the Spanish political scene I thought I should make sure that I knew at least un pocito of what I was going on about so did some research.
> One piece I read put Spain's ongoing structural problems down to waste and duplication and lack of Government control over regional spending. Apparently central government controls less than 50% of total spending.
> Regionalism, according to this piece (from an archived edition of 'The Economist') has led to sixteen Parliaments, uncoordinated health systems where it is allegedly easier for a foreigner to get medical treatment in Andalucia than a native of Catalunya and wasteful duplication of police forces, with towns and some of the regions having their own police forces and the existence of two national police forces.
> I have also discovered that both PP (Aznar's rule) and PSOE (Zapatero) were responsible for the construction bubble...Aznar because of the Land Act of 1998 but this liberalisation of land use policy was encouraged by Zapatero under whose rule bank credit to the private sector soared - this caused the current account deficit to soar from 27 bn euros to over 100 bn euros in his time as PM. Most of this credit came from foreign loans.
> ...


Interesting - Regionalism ....Localism....Localism Bill.....Big Society.....where are we going???


----------



## mrypg9 (Apr 26, 2008)

eric cooper said:


> Interesting - Regionalism ....Localism....Localism Bill.....Big Society.....where are we going???


Well, in the UK and Spain, up s*** creek without a paddle unless the politicians abandon their love affair with neo-liberal economics and start implementing growth policies.


----------



## jimenato (Nov 21, 2009)

mrypg9 said:


> Well, in the UK and Spain, up s*** creek without a paddle unless the politicians abandon their love affair with neo-liberal economics and start implementing growth policies.


Like this?



> The Prime Minister says the government is on an “all-out mission” to kick-start industry. Nick Clegg, the Deputy Prime Minister, will announce that 35,000 jobs will be created using nearly £1 billion of public money.
> He will unveil new investment in more than 100 projects that should trigger billions of pounds additional investment from private enterprise. It will include six “shovel-ready” projects, including two new power stations


----------



## mrypg9 (Apr 26, 2008)

jimenato said:


> Like this?


Yes, but more of the same. This is a belated recognition on the part of the Coalition that Osborne's plan isn't working. The latest growth figures, although slightly better than forecast, are still below the Government's projections.
But this initiative, welcome though it is, is mere sticking plaster on an open and deep wound.


----------

