Rain and snow did not stop thousands of outraged pensioners who took to the streets across Spain on Saturday demanding higher pensions. The pensioners’ protest in cities like Madrid and Barcelona was held three days after the government announced a 0.25 percent increase in pensions this year.
About 8.7 million pensioners believe that pension increases must match the rise in prices, estimated at 1.6 percent this year.
>>> From April, pensions will increase by 0.94 percent
“We cannot allow the government to impoverish pensioners. Their purchasing power is falling at a time when the economy is growing at a rate of 3 percent and prices at a rate of 1.1 percent,” stated the general workers’ union UGT.
“The streets will be full until (Prime Minister Mariano) Rajoy aligns pension increases with inflation,” the union added.
The center-right People’s Party, in power since 2011, stated that the budget is limited and that Brussels controls the budget deficit. After years of economic crisis, public cuts, and borrowing money to rescue failing banks, Prime Minister Rajoy’s government is trying to keep the budget deficit below 3 percent of GDP, as insisted by Brussels.
Street pressure has encouraged the opposition, which sees an opportunity to topple the minority government established at the end of 2016. The centrist Citizens party has surpassed Rajoy’s ruling party and is now the most popular political option in Spain, according to a poll by the public opinion research firm Metroscopia. Citizens have the support of 28.9 percent of voters, the People’s Party 21.5 percent, the left-center PSOE 17 percent, and the left Podemos 17 percent, as published this month.
