SPAIN’S UNEMPLOYMENT HITS A RECORD HIGH OF OVER 27 PER CENT

Spain’s unemployment rate has hit a record all time high of 27.2 per cent of the workforce in the first quarter of this year. This is the highest figure since records began in the mid 1970’s. There are now 6.2 million people out of work.  The jobless rate stood at 7.9 per cent in 2007, but the collapse of the property boom and the economic crisis which began in 2008 has seen the number out of work rising relentlessly since then. Today Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy is to outline his government’s plans aimed at halting the recession in the Eurozone’s fourth largest economy. But opponents of austerity are planning major demonstrations in Madrid and other centres. The International Monetary Fund has forecast that the unemployment rate would peak at 27 per cent this year.