UN Warns One In Four Spaniards Is At Risk Of Poverty

A quarter of the Spanish population lives in poverty or is at risk of social exclusion, warned the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Extreme Poverty and Human Rights, Olivier de Schutter, today.

In the presentation to the UN Human Rights Council of his report started by his predecessor Philip Alston on the situation in the country, he pointed out that despite the fact that Spain is a rich nation, it faces serious problems, such as “a huge housing crisis and structural unemployment among its young people”.

These two serious problems pointed out by the Rapporteur have been worsened during the covid-19 crisis as the population’s income is falling and rent prices are becoming unaffordable.

One in six young people between the ages of 18 and 25 have lost their jobs as a result of the coronavirus pandemic and those who are still working have seen their hours reduced to an average of 23%, with young women being the worst affected. De Schutter stated that measures such as a Minimum Living Income will help to alleviate these problems.

The NGO Oxfam Intermón presented a report in mid-February highlighting the severe issue of poverty in Spain and calculated that it would take 6.4 billion euros a year to lift four million people out of their extremely precarious situations.