Prime Minister Jose Luis Zapatero said he was ending a
special jobless payment for the long-term unemployed worth 426 euros a month, a
year after it was introduced for claimants whose benefit had run out.
He also said Madrid would sell 30 percent of its state
lottery, allow private companies to take up to 49 percent stakes in airports
and airport services, and take steps to support small and medium-sized firms.
"These measures ... favor economic investments,
employment and especially the small and medium sized companies," Zapatero
said.
Spain's country's biggest airports, Madrid and Barcelona,
would be run privately through concessions, Prime Minister Jose Luis Zapatero told
parliament. Both are currently state-owned.
The government believes the airports authority AENA could be
worth up to 30 billion euros. Spain's public sector deficit is expected to come
in at around 9.3 percent of GDP this year, a little less than 100 billion
euros.
The jobless welfare payment was available to Spaniards whose
unemployment benefit had run out after claiming up to two years and had been
taken up by around 70,000 people.
Spain's efforts to rein in the budget deficit are under the
microscrope as financial markets drive up its debt costs, fueled by concerns
about stagnant growth and its ability to find a new economic model after a
property collapse.
The premium investors demand to hold Spanish over German
touched euro-era records on Tuesday, but it fell back on Wednesday as traders
bet the European Central Bank could increase its bond-buying program.
Spanish unemployment, the highest in the euro zone, fell for
the first time in over 3 years in the third quarter to 19.8 percent. The extra
payment for the long-term unemployed was up for revision every six months.
Spain hauled itself out of recession at the start of this
year, but economists warn it may contract again as the impact of fiscal
cutbacks across Europe take hold.
A survey on Wednesday showed factory output stuttered in
November, with a weak domestic market outweighing gains for exports, leaving
the sector close to slipping back into recession.
Carmakers association ANFAC also said sales fell by 25.5
percent in November from a year earlier, the fifth month of double-digit
declines following the end of government subsidies.
The measures aimed at SMEs would not affect the government's
commitment to slash the public deficit to 6 percent of gross domestic product
next year, Economy Minister Elena Salgado told parliament.
"The deficit target is unconditional. All our goals are
secondary to this 6 percent," Salgado said.
Spain had one of the highest public deficits in the euro
zone in 2009 of 11.1 percent and has passed austerity plans and introduced
spending cuts as part of next year's budget worth around 50 billion euros to
reduce the shortfall.
