1. A FAMILY
Page 24 Irish Daily Mail, Monday, July 9, 2012
FAMILIES raiding rubbish bins for
food; an entire generation trapped
by insurmountable debt; mass
unemployment. In an illuminating
dispatch on Saturday, Brian Carroll
described the alarming challenges
ordinary Spanish people face daily.
FORSAKEN
Today, he reveals how families
have been betrayed by irresponsi-
ble bankers, persistent corruption
and a government too long in
denial...
by Brian
Carroll
In Madrid
I
T’S approaching midnight on
Azucena is a married mother of
Friday in Plaza Mayor, a 400-
year-old cobblestoned square
in central Madrid. The Madrid
Orchestra is playing for free on
the site where they used to
three forced to live in a squat
burn heretics at the height of the
Spanish Inquisition.
Tourists and Spaniards — distinguishable
by the presence of grandparents and toddlers
at their tables — sit outside the restaurants
after being evicted from the
that line the square, beneath elegant apart-
ments painted clay-red, and framed by
wrought-iron balconies.
As Beethoven’s 7th Symphony lingers on
the balmy air, they drink wine and pick from
plates of suckling pig, octopus and the
family home. She fears losing
Galician green pepper dish of Pimientos de
Padrón. Even here, surrounded by such
history, a three-course meal and wine costs
less than €€25.
My Spanish waiter, who speaks English,
Dutch, German, and Italian fluently, having
her children. It’s a harrowing
worked across Europe in a 40-year career,
Like half of those
under 25 in Spain,
she is unemployed parable of the financial crisis
shrugs when I point to the orchestra and ask
him what the special occasion is. ‘This is
Madrid,’ he says simply.
Spain, with its sun-soaked cultural cocktail in Spain – a country where
banks are stuffed with cronies
of cities like Madrid, Barcelona, Valencia
and Seville, and its coastal resorts from the
Costa Bravo to the Costa del Sol, will
always attract tourists — they spent almost
€€50billion here last year. But, like a bon viveur
whose good days have eventually caught
and corruption is endemic
up with her, beneath the surface, Spain is
riddled with the economic contagion spread-
ing across the eurozone and the world.
Earlier on Friday, I’d travelled to northern
Madrid to meet Azucena Paredes Villar, a
blonde 30-year-old Spanish mother of three.
She buzzed me through the electronic gates
of her apartment building — a
nondescript red-brick high-rise over-
looking dry wasteland in Roquetas mother’s €€600 a month pension, and promised €€100billion in bailout of the neighbourhood association same — bankers were giving credit to
de Mar, a working class suburb at whatever help her mother, who lives funds from the European Stability where MP lived, said he had sought everyone without any controls.
the Pinar De Chamartin end of the on €€500 a month, can give her. She Mechanism — have shown no mercy. shelter for his family from the local ‘They created a bubble and now
blue Metro line. doesn’t speak English and pleads There are evictions scheduled in housing council, but had been turned everyone is suffering in Greece, in
I could hear her two-year-old son through an interpreter for us not to barrios across Madrid today and down twice on the day he took his Ireland and here.’
crying as I walked up the cracked photograph her children: ‘The chil- throughout the week. On average, own life. And just like hundreds of thousands
marble steps to her second floor dren could end up in a foster home across Spain, there are 159 evictions Groups like the Plataforma de of Irish people, the Spanish were
squat. Beyond the damaged front and my grandmother in a residence.’ every day, and four out of every five Afectados por la Hipoteca (PAH) induced to buy their own homes, with
door, inside the cramped two-bed When a squatter is evicted, and involve families with children. orchestrate campaigns against the 100 per cent mortgages.
apartment, I meet her sick son, and children are involved, the Directorate Suicides have increased by 20 per banks, and try to physically stop Banks often loaned up to ten times
his two older sisters, aged three General Of Care For Children And cent since 2008, and prescriptions for evictions. However, the courts, imple- the applicant’s salary. Home owner-
and five. There is a large hole in the Adolescents (DGAIA) will automati- medication to treat depression have menting a range of public order laws ship levels in Spain are among the
living room door and a sense of cally convene a meeting with the par- increased by 35 per cent. A resident introduced by the new government, highest in the EU.
desperation everywhere. ent or parents to discuss custody of of Hospitalet de Llobregat, in are able to pass injunctions stopping The giant mortgage lender Bankia,
Azucena’s 88-year-old grandmother, the children, if those evicted have no PAH from interfering with evictions. which is responsible for 80 per cent of
Tomasa Morcillo, is asleep in another suitable alternative accommodation. As in Ireland, the people feel a huge the evictions in Madrid, has asked for
‘My children
room. Azucena, her children, and her Azucena tried to shield her children sense of injustice, that the banks are €€23.4billion in bailout funds — but it
grandmother are all squatters here in from the eviction but her eldest being bailed out, while all the arms is believed to have losses of more
this bank-repossessed apartment. daughter witnessed the reality of of the State — the government, the than €€100billion on its books.
They were evicted from the family
home — an apartment in a nearby
building — on November 18 last year,
Spain’s economic collapse at first
hand. ‘The eldest came home from
school and found all her little things
could end up in legislature, the judiciary, and the
police — are used to throw people
out of their homes.
The Spanish equivalent of Anglo
Irish Bank, Bankia’s story is a para-
ble of the greed, political corruption
after they fell behind on the €€800
monthly payments. Azucena now
sleeps with her three children in one
on the street and she got scared,’
Azucena said. ‘We told her the old
house broke and that’s why we’re in
a foster home’ Olmo Gálvez, a 31-year-old IT
entrepreneur who spent three years
working in China before returning to
and lack of regulation which has now
forced Ireland, Portugal, Greece,
Iceland, Cyprus and Spain to seek
room, with her grandmother in the the new one.’ Madrid in 2010, tells me: ‘The EU is bailouts. Spain was promised €€100bn
other. Her partner has since moved There are 300,000 others in Madrid Madrid, hung himself in a park near giving money to the banks but the for its banks on June 29, but already
back in with his parents, like 50 per who are threatened with eviction his home, after his two years on banks must pay interest to the ECB. the markets have issued their judg-
cent of Spanish 30-year-olds. after falling behind on mortgage the dole ran out and he received an ‘Someone has to pay for it, but ment — the crucial ten-year bond
Azucena is unemployed, like one in payments or rents. When the police eviction notice. many of the banks are broke. Spain yield in Spain, the amount the
two people aged under 25 in Spain. came to evict Azucena and her family, Identified only as MP, he was a will not carry the debt, so someone government in Madrid pays to bor-
She used to survive on €€390 a month protesters fought with them on the 45-year-old electrician, married with else will have to pay it. We are not row, soared back above seven per
from welfare, but in Spain the dole is street outside, and neighbours helped one daughter, and, like 1.5million going to repay a debt that has been cent on Friday. Spain’s conservative
cut off after two years. kick in the door of the nearby apart- others in Spain, had lost his job due artificially created by bankers, politi- government — run by the Popular
She now gets by on emergency ment she now illegally occupies. The to the collapse of the construction cians and investors. In Ireland, Party — has been telling its people
funding from charities, her grand- Spanish banks — who have been industry. Juan Alvarez, the chairman Greece and Iceland it happened the that the State hasn’t been rescued,

2. Irish Daily Mail, Monday, July 9, 2012 Page 41
Vibrant: Madrid’s Plaza Mayor remains a hub of activity
this year alone. Income taxes have Guardamar are in Russian — because
increased while, as in Ireland, various they are now the only ones investing
indirect levies are further squeezing in property. Meanwhile, the Chinese
middle incomes. are taking over vacant commercial
With plans to cut tax reliefs on indi- units with giant low-cost hyper-
vidual property investments and to markets that are driving Spanish
increase VAT to 18 per cent across a providers out of business.
range of services — including restau- In the Costa Blanca area there is so
rants and bars which currently pay a much hot money circulating, locals
maximum of 8 per cent — Spain used to call €€500 notes Bin Ladens
hopes to squeeze another €€8billion — because the authorities would nev-
out of taxpayers in 2013. er find them. The ECB has allegedly
These are harsh measures, but Spain tracked more €€500 notes in circula-
has to cough up €€27.5billion in matur- tion in Costa Blanca than any other
ing debt by the end of October and it part of the EU. Although Osama bin
has only weeks to agree terms for the Laden is now dead, the black market
first €€40billion of that immense is thriving across Spain, which has
€€100billion bailout. Indeed, Reuters one of the highest rates of non-tax
has quoted government sources paying workers in the EU, according
saying that unless Spain gets this to the European Centre For Econom-
€€40billion by the end of July, national- ic And Social Rights.
ised lenders Bankia, CatalunyaCaixa, Spain’s Gestha Union of Tax
NovaGalicia and Banco de Valencia Inspectors (GESTHA) estimates the
will collapse. The money will not come annual tax loss is equivalent to
without conditions, however, and the €€88billion a year. It’s not surprising,
price for an EU-backed bailout will be against such a backdrop of political
long overdue reform of Spain’s politi- and banking corruption, close to
cal and banking sectors — politicians €€100billion was taken out of Spain
and political appointees still control- last year alone.
led 80 per cent of Spain’s financial In shades of Fianna Fáil’s nefarious
institutions in 2010. past, party apparatchiks presided
Party hacks and even politicial over dubious planning decisions
wives and girlfriends were appointed across Spain. Luis Rivera Gurrea-
to the boards of banks throughout Nozaleda works with start-up
Spain. The CAM bank in Valencia, companies in the internet and
mobile industry in Madrid. He says
some work has been done to reform
the system, but the last bastions of
One bank had a power are the politicians themselves
and the estimated 250,000 who earn
ballet dancer
State payments through public serv-
ice jobs. ‘Very little has been done
around the 150,000 politicians in
on its committee Spain and the 250,000 non-political
politicians — those people who are
union representatives or who have
public function type jobs and get a
which received a €€6billion bailout government subsidy. That is what we
from Spanish taxpayers had a ballet have to start cleaning up. No-one
dancer on its ‘control committee’. has started addressing that.’
And Bankia, then headed by Joe Haslam is professor at the
Rodrigo Rato, a close political ally of School of Entrepreneurship at the IE
Rajoy, falsified its accounts, ahead of Business School in Madrid. From
a share offering. It claimed it had Ireland, he believes reforms will work,
made a €€309million profit, when in but only if the older order moves aside
fact another set of accounts showed to let the generation born after 1975
the true picture: losses of €€3billion. — the year Franco died and democ-
Struggle: Azucena Following a court ruling last week, racy returned to Spain — flourish.
Paredes Villar Rato will now face criminal charges. ‘Spain has a far better than chance
squats illegally Meanwhile, Aurelio Izquierdo, one of a return to growth than Greece,
of Bankia’s leading executives con- Italy or Portugal. The pre-democracy
with her children tinues to draw a €€14million pension. generation has done a good job
and grandmother The stories of corruption are legion. in bringing stability after 40 years
In the Costa Blanca area —best largely cut off from the world, but
known to Irish holiday-makers for re- now they need to hand over to the
sorts like Alicante — mayors of towns new generation, those born after
took suitcases of cash to approve 1975, who are more outward looking
dodgy planning developments. On and allow them to bloom.’
Saturday, I took the three-and-a-half From 1936 to 1938, the people of
just its banks. But less than ten protested with a nationwide Spanish government insisted until hour train journey from Madrid to Madrid led a bizarre double life, as
days after a €€100billion bank bail- strike. In Valencia 98 per cent 2010 that there was no economic cri- Alicante, where in the nearby town of they fought Franco’s advance with
out, it now seems certain Spain — the of pharmacists went on strike in June sis in Spain before it was ousted from Orihuela, the mayor, Monica Lorente, the catchphrase ‘No pasaran’ (They
EU’s fifth largest economy — will power by Mariano Rajoy’s Popular and five members of the Popular shall not pass), and went about their
need more money, just to run the Party in November. However much Party, have been indicted on corrup- daily lives while bombers strafed
country and keep paying benefits to
its 4.6million unemployed.
Despite already having the highest
Spain spends Rajoy insists on spinning that every-
thing is alright with the Spanish cof-
fers, the days of Spanish procrastina-
tion charges. In a case that’s seen as
typical of endemic local political
corruption in Spain: the mayor and
Madrid and artillery fire turned the
Gran Via, Madrid’s main thorough-
fare, into ‘Howitzer Alley’.
unemployment rate in the EU, a
bailout for Spain’s banks will mean €64billion more tion, and Mañana politics are over.
Spain, with a 46million population,
her party colleagues are accused of
rigging public service contracts, to
grant lucrative rubbish collection
For two years, they refused to
accept the reality that they were
surrounded on all sides, before finally
than it takes in
more austerity for Azucena and her spends €€64billion a year more than it
compatriots — who have already seen takes in — compared to Ireland’s licences to friends of the Popular negotiating a surrender in 1939.
€€10billion of cuts in education and €€9.4billion deficit. Party, which currently runs Spain. There is a growing feeling in
health, as well as increased VAT Spain’s middle class has already In an area where most earn less Europe, particularly in Germany, that
charges, and a series of indirect been squeezed by direct tax increas- than €€15,000 a year, there are no long- Spain needs to end the political cha-
taxation hikes. The bite of austerity because the government couldn’t pay es aimed at raising more than er any cranes on the skyline of Costa rade that everything is OK, and admit
is becoming more severe across them the €€480million it owes for dis- €€6illion and spending cuts designed Blanca. The advertising hoardings that along with its banks, the State
society. Teachers have already pensing medicines. The previous to deliver over €€9billion in savings that dot the roads from Alicante to and its people are also in trouble.