EY cull

ers will have access to this funding on the understanding that the properties will be available as social housing for at least 50 years,” government sources said. Not all of the 50,000 properties acquired by Sareb when the 2008 property bubble burst will be immediately available, however.

Twenty­one thousand of the Sareb homes are finished and the bank possesses enough land to build 15,000 more, but a further 14,000 are at present occupied by squatters. Raquel Sanchez, Transport and Urban Agenda minister, explained during a La Sexta television interview, that where possible the government hoped to be able to “legalise the situation” of the squatters.

The minister did not mention that only 2,230 of Sareb’s properties were located in Madrid, Valencia, or Barcelona whose respective rents had risen by 10.4, 18.4 and 19.1 per cent since March 2022.

LONDON­BASED accountancy firm Ernst & Young (EY) is cutting 3,000 US jobs, citing overcapacity. Days earlier, EY abandoned plans to separate its auditing and consulting divisions although the company maintained that the reductions were unrelated. The cuts affecting approximately 5 per cent of its US workforce were part of its ongoing management of the business, said EY, promising “comprehensive support” to those affected.