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Palma.—Balearic President Jose Ramon Bauza said yesterday that “those who are unemployed are not guilty for the high jobless rate” but rather those who belong to the Spanish Socialist Workers Party (PSOE) are.

The President's remarks came in response to Socialist calls for him to retract remarks he made about people who are registered as unemployed with the Balearic job centre (SOIB). Bauza allegedly said that there are some people who are on the jobless list who are hoping that they won't be called for work.

Speaking at a Parliamentary meeting yesterday, Bauza said that he wasn't looking for “guilty parties” but rather the solution to the unemployment problem. He said that he wasn't going to do as the Socialists suggested and commission more public works “because there simply wasn't the money to pay for it.” Bauza told Socialist leader Francina Armengol he didn't want a repetition of the so-called “Plan E” of former Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, an urban improvement programme which was designed to kick start an ailing economy, but which failed.

Armengol said that the President should stop being so autocratic and provide more support for the island residents now that his policies were failing.
She said that the President was claiming that there were signs of economic recovery but “the reality is that we are falling further into recession.”