According to the Banco de Espana, the amount of debt owed by the regional government of Murcia reached its highest level ever during the second quarter of 2019. A figure of 9,699 million euros equates to 30.7 per cent of the Region's GDP.
Despite all of the cutbacks ushered in around 8 years ago as Spain entered recession, the expenditure of the Murcia government continues to exceed its revenue, as it does in many others among Spain's 17 regions, with the largest debts in absolute terms being those accumulated in Catalunya, the Comunidad Valenciana, Andalucia and Madrid.
However, these regions also have the largest populations, so their higher level of debt is not that remarkable. For this reason the comparison between debt and GDP is a more meaningful one, and it shows that the level is higher in Murcia than in all but three regions (42.2 per cent in the Comunidad Valenciana, 35.3 per cent in Castilla-La Mancha and 33.9 per cent in Catalunya). At the other end of the scale the lowest figures are reported in the Canaries (14.2 per cent), the Basque Country (14.3 per cent) and Madrid (14.9 per cent).
Meanwhile, the total debt owed by all public administration bodies reached 1,210,915 million euros at the end of June. Not only is this the highest figure on record, the amount by which it rose during the three months of the second quarter was also higher than ever before at 10,470 million euros, and the new figure is the equivalent of 99 per cent of GDP, well above the stated aim of the government which is to bring it down to 95.8 per cent by the end of the year.
Source: murciatoday.com
