SPAIN: EU Budgets & more – 13th Feb 2025

Buenos días from Gracia! This is the Rorshok Spain Update from the 13th of February twenty twenty-five. A quick summary of what's going down in Spain.

Let’s start this week with some EU budget news. On Tuesday, the 11th, Spain urged the EU to create a permanent system to double the Union’s budget beyond 2 trillion euros, which would allow Spain’s government to borrow more money.

Led by President Pedro Sanchez, the government is seeking to extend the post-Covid borrowing scheme which is set to expire in twenty twenty-six. Extending the scheme would require a change in EU regulations and delay the EU’s debt repayment, a path that faces resistance from Germany and northern European countries worried about sharing debt.

Spain has proposed alternative ways for the EU to pay off its current debt, including using around 400 billion euros from the eurozone bailout fund.

While Spain’s government pushes for more money, a recent study by the global civil society organization Transparency International has found that Spain has worsened in corruption.

On Tuesday, the 11th, Transparency International revealed that Spain dropped ten positions in the twenty twenty-four Corruption Perception Index or CPI ranking 46th out of 180 countries. The CPI uses a scale from zero to 100. 100 is very clean and zero is highly corrupt.

Spain’s corruption score fell to fifty-six out of 100, down from sixty in twenty twenty-three. The country also slipped from 14th to 16th place among the EU’s twenty-seven members, overtaken by Latvia. With a score of ninety, Denmark came in first. On the other end of the scale, Sudan scored the worst with eight.

Transparency International attributes this drop to delays in Spain adopting EU directives, with eighty-seven still pending. Only four regions in Spain have active anti-fraud agencies, a number the organization says needs to be changed to increase positive perception.

On Monday the 11th, President Pedro Sánchez vowed to defend Spain’s economic interests alongside the European Union against the U.S. trade war, as called by media outlet Europa Press.

During the speech to Congress, Sánchez criticized the efforts to dismantle global trade, warning that such conflicts could harm Europe’s working and middle classes.

Without naming Donald Trump directly, he denounced a system based on hostility and the law of the strongest. He affirmed Spain’s commitment to cooperation and pledged to protect Spanish industries and workers. Sánchez also reiterated the country’s support for a two-state solution in the Israel-Palestine conflict, advocating for diplomacy over violence.

On the next day, energy giants BP and Iberdrola began the construction of the country’s largest green hydrogen plant in Castellón, Eastern Spain.

The 70 million euro project, approved in September last year, will feature a twenty-five MW electrolyser, a high-power 25-megawatt machine capable of efficiently splitting large quantities of water into hydrogen, generating a substantial hydrogen output. Iberdrola’s wind and solar energy will power it.

The plant is set to be operational by late twenty twenty-six, and will hopefully cut CO2 emissions by 23,000 tonnes per year. The project, which will most likely generate over 500 jobs, has already received fifteen million euros in EU funding.

Meanwhile, on Thursday, the 6th, Óscar López, Spain’s Minister for Digital Transformation, announced a new order to restrict commercial spam calls to numbers with 800, 900, or provincial prefixes.

The order, expected to be approved this month, aims to curb telephone spam and scams by preventing companies from using mobile numbers. While not eliminating commercial calls entirely, the regulation will make them easier to identify and block.

Consumers can report misuse to the Consumer Affairs Department, and companies that violate the rule will face sanctions, however, they have not been stipulated yet.

Now, some updates on social media. On Monday, the 10th, Yolanda Díaz, Spain’s Deputy Prime Minister, announced plans to regulate child influencers and prevent parental exploitation.

Under the proposed reform, children under fourteen will need government approval to work on social media, they must attend school, and have legal guardians present when posting content. Parents will be banned from profiting from their children’s earnings, which must be placed in bank accounts for the minors.

A twenty twenty-four study raised ethical and legal concerns about sharenting — that is, when parents share a large amount of potentially sensitive information about their children online, which many parents benefit from, often financially.

In entertainment, let’s talk about the results of what many consider the Spanish Oscars. On Saturday, the 8th, the 38th Goya Awards, Spain's main national annual film awards, took place at the Palacio de Congresos in Granada, in the South.

In a historic first, two films shared the Best Picture award: El 47 by Marcel Barren, and La Infiltrada by Arantxa Echevarría. El 47 emerged as the night’s biggest winner, with victories for Salva Reina as Best Actor, Clara Segura as Best Actress, and Carlos Apolinario for Best Editing.

Turning to sports, on Saturday, the 8th, Spain secured its place at the twenty twenty-seven Rugby World Cup in Australia with a dominant 43-13 victory over Switzerland.

This victory marks Spain’s first qualification for the World Cup since nineteen ninety-nine. While Spain dominated Switzerland, the tournament's expansion to twenty-four teams certainly aided their qualification.

While football, basketball, and tennis might be the first sports you think of when Spain is brought up, the nation's interest in Rugby is trending upward, especially since major cities such as Madrid, Barcelona, and Valladolid are making the sport more accessible by hosting the sport in major stadiums and increasing its presence.

Speaking of football, on Tuesday, the 11th, Luis Rubiales, the former president of the Spanish Football Federation, testified in court as part of the ongoing court case between himself and Jenni Hermoso. The case revolves around Rubiales’ inappropriate kiss after the Spanish women’s team won the World Cup final in August last year.

During the ongoing trial, David Morillo, a lip-reading expert brought forward as a witness by Rubiales’ defense team, said that during the infamous moment, Rubiales requested a little kiss from Hermoso, to which she consented. However, Morilla did outline that he only analyzed the video that was published on TikTok.

However, the prosecutors quickly challenged Morillo's credentials and experience, also raising concerns about whether the location of his association in Granada, in Rubiales' hometown, indicated a potential link to the former president.

As the trial continues, Rubiales faces charges of sexual assault and coercion, with prosecutors seeking a two-and-a-half-year prison sentence.

In the women’s football league, on Sunday the 9th, during a Liga F football match between Barcelona and Espanyol, a controversial incident occurred in the 15th minute. Barcelona defender Mapi León and Espanyol’s Daniela Caracas collided and footage appeared to show León touching Caracas in the groin area, sparking outrage.

Espanyol released a statement condemning the act as unacceptable and accused León of violating the privacy of their player. Caracas reportedly did not react immediately but later recognized the seriousness of the incident. León denied wrongdoing, insisting the contact was unintentional and part of the game.

In the music world, Bad Bunny remains dominant on Spain's singles chart, holding the top three spots. Bad Bunny’s popularity in Spain stems from his fusion of reggaeton and Latin trap, styles that continue to capture audiences across the country, specifically in Madrid, where there is a significant South American community.

Not only does the Puerto Rican pop star hold the top three spots, four of the top five songs in the singles chart are his. His latest album, released last month, Debí Tirar Más Fotos or I Should Have of Taken More Photos, continues to impact the charts, with seventeen tracks in Spain’s Top 100.

Closing this edition, here’s an interesting tasty tradition. In a recent interview with El Pais, Elena Arzak, the daughter of Spanish chef Juan Mari Arzak, spoke about her family´s Michelin-starred restaurant and her father´s famous dish, calling it a universal favorite.

In nineteen seventy-one, Spanish chef Juan Mari Arzak created the pastel de kabrarroka, a dish that became a cornerstone of Basque haute cuisine. Inspired by a local fish cake, Arzak refined the recipe by adding cream and using kabrarroka, or scorpionfish, for its shellfish-like flavor..

So, the next time you're in the Basque country, in the north, find yourself a bite of delicious history.

Aaand that’s it for this week! Thank you for joining us!

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¡Hasta la próxima!