Although some might think Spain already has a deep-enough alphabet soup of political parties, yet another one joined the fray this week. This is a ‘new centre party’ – The Union for Progress and Democracy [UPD]. Formed by an ex PSOE socialist and a philosopher, its purpose, they say, is to bring democracy back to Spain by providing an alternative to the two-party system. And it will defend the Spanish Constitution by ‘resisting reactionary nationalism’ and avoiding concessions to terrorists. Two of its main aims are for education to become the responsibility of the state rather than of the regions and for changes in the electoral law to prevent any benefit to nationalist parties in parliament. Perhaps it will turn out to be as useful and relevant as the Lib Dems in the UK. Which is not very much, of course.

Writing the above paragraph has reminded me I will probably not live long enough to master the intricacies of the way power is shared between national, regional and municipal politicians in Spain. Not only do the regions/‘nations’ have varying degrees of autonomy – with the Basque Country leading the field – but key areas such as Health, Housing, Taxation, Education and Traffic are handled differently amongst themselves. As I said recently, Housing is not a central but a regional matter. Whereas Traffic is managed from Madrid - except for the Basque Country and Catalunia. All this is a prelude to reporting that the Galician Xunta is unhappy it can’t get control of the measures - whatever they are – designed to put an end to this region’s high road mortality figures.

Speaking of which . . . Today’s Voz de Galicia features the standard sad Monday morning headline - Several more young people killed on Galician roads in the early hours of Sunday morning. The toll of five included two 15 year old girls in a car of six teenagers returning from the Saturday night botellón. Naturally, the driver was above the drink limit. And naturally there were no police checks near the cattle market used for this event. I wouldn’t have thought this needed central authorisation. Or much thinking about even. I still wonder whether this isn’t done because it would be considered ‘ignoble’. Or even ‘fascist’.

The Spanish press – or at least those elements of it which don’t support the government – have begun to report the steady drip of economic data which prove the property boom is well and truly over. Yesterday’s El Mundo summed up the situation thus – The experts say that the deceleration in the construction industry, the engine of the economy over the last few years, is more important than the government has foreseen. The landing is not going to be ‘gentle’. And to this has to be added uncertainty caused by the financial crisis. All of this has been overlooked by the Finance Minister in making his projections for 2008. It went on to add that the Spanish economy is now much more vulnerable than it was a couple of months ago and is more exposed than others. Vamos a ver, I guess.

Mind you, I can’t say I’m totally convinced by El Mundo’s reportage. They claim this weekend that Spanish women see white hair as sexy. Or at least the streaks of grey/white which are called canas here. I can’t say I’ve noticed this much. And I’ve got the blue eyes that are alleged to be another magnet. Must be my pink face that puts them off. It can’t be my charming personality.

To finish off - I've long suspected most Spanish men dye their hair as they age. Especially the one in Pontevedra whose fine mane recently changed overnight from jet black to dazzling white. I'll be interested to see whether the above report leads to increased evidence of the correctness of my suspicion.

P. S. Does anyone know what 'Far football' [lejano fútbol] is?