The Spanish Catholic Church charity organization, Cáritas, helped over 20,000 people-in-need, in the province of Granada alone during 2013. Cáritas in its annual report pointed out that 13,117 of that number are from the city itself. This means that the city’s figures for those seeking help from the charity increased by 451% in one year.

To put that into perspective that is equivalent to almost every man, woman and child living in Almuñécar. In the meantime, the Central Government congratulates itself on how well things are going now.

It was at the end of March that Cáritas published its national 2013 figures, which also included the “perspectives for 2014.” it was truly alarming.

The very next day the Minister for Hacienda, Cristóbal Montoro stated that he did not believe the balance provided by the religious charity: “They do not correspond to reality; they’re purely statistical studies,” he opined. The national ombudsman agrees with the charity, however.

And of course, as the Government, in the run up for the European Elections, has been energetically pushing a much rosier image, Cáritas‘s conclusion that nationwide poverty figures have grown by 60% since the beginning of the crisis (a total of 11 million people) it puts a hole in the float line of their electoral campaign message.

Jolly inconvenient, to say the least.

(News: Province of Granada)