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Spanish unemployment falls in June
By Miles Johnson in Madrid

The number of Spaniards out of work fell in June ahead of the country’s tourist season as Madrid said it would announce further steps to meet its ambitious budget deficit reduction plans for this year.

The number of registered unemployed in Spain dropped by 98,853 month-on- month from May to June, data from the country’s labour ministry showed – the largest fall in June since the data series began in 1996.

The 2.1 per cent fall took Spanish joblessness down to 4.62m, with unemployment levels dropping across all of the country’s 17 autonomous regions in the third consecutive month of falling number of claimants.

Luis de Guindos, Spain’s finance minister, said that while the data should be viewed in a seasonal context, with industries such as tourism taking on employees for the summer period, the June drop in claimants was positive.

Engracia Hidalgo, secretary of state for employment, said: “June is traditionally a good month for jobs, but this has never reached a decrease of almost 100,000 people”.