Is the Spanish Government on the verge of collapse?

eggcup quote... repeat: who are the others who are capable of getting Spain out of this mess, no matter what their nationality?

 I would offer up the following...

Carme Chacon, María Teresa Fernández de la Vega Sanz, Elena Salgado Méndez and Trinidad Jiménez García-Herrera; it's no coincidence that all are socialists and all are female, but let's face it the present incumbents qualify nicely the phrase "Couldnt organise a p*ss up in a brewery."

If there is one male Spanish politician that might just fit the bill it would be Patxi Lopez,  yes, yet another socialist, but as is becoming clearer by the day, Spain cannot thrive under a non-socialist government, there is just too much self interest. The Franco years and the Aznar years are proof of this.

The ladies and Paxti together would be a force to be reckoned with.

Whilst it's true that the ladies all hels senior positions in the Zapatero government when things turned to ratsh*t, they were not as individuals in a position to avert the collapse of the economy; the real top brass itself was incredibly weak, unwilling even to admit that there was a problem,  they just sat there idly tuning their fiddles while Madrid (and the rest of Spain) burned.

It was a foregone conclusion that Zapatero and the PSOE would lose the election in  November 2011, but that's the problem with all two party politics; had the PP been in power during the initial stages of the crisis they too would have been ousted just as Brown was ousted in the UK elections that brough Cameron and the Tories into power.

I am still a firm believer in the comment of Billy Connolly that  "Anyone who wishes to become a politician should automatically be banned from becoming one"

So in answer to the thread question "Is the Spanish Government on the verge of collapse?" I would answer yes... BUT it wont....

 Well to be honest I don't think they could organise a p*** up in a brewery either. They clearly weren't capable of keeping their political party out of trouble and under control. Or they were too blind to see what was going on or they were turning a blind eye to it as well. Of the 464 criminal charges that are being trialed at the moment, 200 are against PP politicians and civil servants working under the PP and 264 are against PSOE politicians and civil servants working under the PSOE. So I would say they are all as corrupt or stupid as each other. Becasue no one came out saying "Hey my party is corrupt".

What the country needs is fresh blood to knock all this on the head. Someone who hasn't been contaminated by all this corruption. It'a a tall order.

Robert Francis, QC, has just reported the findings of his enquiry into the Stafford hospital and has got me thinking.  He came up with 290 recommendations to change the culture of the NHS - identifying the lack of care, compassion, humanity and leadership.  There is apparently a culture of complacency and bad practice is ingrained at all levels in the NHS (my father-in-law died because of this also).  It will be a massive job to put all of this right as it is endemic, systemic, institutionalised etc.  I  think there are a lot of parallels between this and the situation generally in Spain, and it is clear that Spain needs someone clear-thinking like him to cut through all the bullshit, recognise the extent of the problems and start coming up with plans to identify the main problems and come up with a grand strategy.   The Spanish Government has to recognise that it is not up to the job and would do well to appoint several independent, clear-sighted men such as Robert Francis to get the ball rolling.