That was supposed to be the end of the ‘macropuente’, which effectively caused havoc to businesses and resulted in a lack of productivity, according to President Rajoy.

The ‘macropuentes’ survived 2015 and it has now been announced that they will continue in 2016 as well. Hooooray!

This means that several weeks next year will only consist of three working days, or even less.

Earlier this week, the director of the Economics Office of Moncloa in Madrid admitted that there hadn’t been much interest in going ahead with Rajoy’s idea of moving some national holidays to a Monday or Friday, so this proposal, it seems, has now been shelved for good.

Although the labour calendar set by the Department for Employment for 2016 has not officially been approved yet, all of Spain’s autonomous regions have already published theirs.

Christmas Day this year falls on a Friday, which means that employees could end up with almost two weeks of holiday just by booking Monday 28 December – Thursday 31 December and Monday 4 January – Tuesday 5 January off, as Wednesday 6 is also a holiday (Three Kings). This would mean 13 days off work just by booking 6 days’ holiday. By taking the following Thursday and Friday as holiday too, this would extend the Christmas period even further, if your employer allows it!

The majority of holidays do depend on the regional governments themselves, but there a 4 national holidays which are set in stone by the central office in Madrid: Christmas, New Year, 1 May and 12 October. The rest are celebrated according to each region.

So, the dates that we all need to know for next year are as follows:

• New Year’s Day: Friday 1 January
• Three Kings Day: Wednesday 6 January
• Good Friday: Friday 25 March
• Easter Sunday: Sunday 27 March
• Labour Day: Sunday 1 May
• Assumption of the Virgin: Monday 15 August
• Columbus Day: Wednesday 12 October
• All Saints Day: Tuesday 1 November
• Constitution Day: Tuesday 6 December
• Immaculate Conception Day: Thursday 8 December
• Christmas Day: Sunday 25 December
• Fiestas in some autonomous regions:
• Monday 29 February: Andalucía
• Tuesday 1 March: Balearic Islands
• Saturday 19 March: Valencia and Murcia
• Thursday 24 March: All except Cataluña
• Monday 28 March: Balearic Islands, Cataluña, Valencia, La Rioja, Navarra, País Vasco
• Saturday 23 April: Aragón and Castilla y León
• Monday 2 May: Andalucía, Aragón, Canary Islands, Castilla y León and Madrid
• Monday 16 May: Cataluña
• Tuesday 17 May: Galicia
• Thursday 26 May: Castilla-La Mancha
• Monday 30 May: Canary Islands
• Tuesday 31 May: Castilla-La Mancha
• Thursday 9 June: Murcia and La Rioja
• Friday 24 June: Galicia and Cataluña
• Monday 25 July: Galicia, Madrid, Navarra, La Rioja and País Vasco
• Thursday 28 July: Cantabria
• Thursday 8 September: Asturias and Extremadura
• Thursday 15 September: Cantabria
• Friday 7 October: País Vasco
• Saturday 3 December: Navarra
• Monday 26 December: Andalucía, Aragón, Baleares, Cantabria, Castilla-La Mancha, Castilla y León, Cataluña, Valencia, Madrid, Navarra and Murcia

Source: www.abc.es, www.calendario-365.es

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