Mr Rajoy, the figures don’t add up- mission impossible

Everybody knows Spain is in real trouble. What few seem to grasp though, is the fact the figures don’t add up. Trying to revive the economy with austerity, and expecting people to believe the figures, is a fairytale. Wonder just how the banks are valuing the ever increasing property book? They still seem to apply those “was” prices. More on the impossible mission, via El Pais.

Spain has set its course and there is turning back” has been Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy’s mantra since taking office in January after committing himself to reducing the budget deficit from 8.5 percent of GDP to three percent by 2013 in a bid to avoid an ECB and IMF bailout, as has happened in Greece, Portugal, and Ireland.

The prime minister said on April 13 that it was “not possible” for the EU to rescue Spain: “If we don’t meet the deficit targets, they will stop lending to us, and if no one lends to us, they will have to rescue us. Because the government rules out the possibility of a rescue and intervention, that’s why we’re implementing reforms.”

Determined to fulfill the constitutional amendment agreed last year with his predecessor José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero that obliges the government to balance its books well ahead of its 2020 deadline, the prime minister’s goal for this year is reduce the deficit to 5.3 percent. He says he can do so without reducing pensions and unemployment benefits or cutting civil service salaries, which collectively make up 40 percent of government spending.

Few, including the Bank of Spain, believe that Rajoy can pull it off without going back on his word.

Full article here.