Pedro Sanchez and his deputy prime minister, Pablo Iglesias, have been outspoken critics of how Brussels and the European Union have handled the COVID-19 pandemic, but it appears that Spain, along with Italy, is in line for the lion share of the EU financial relief programme.
Italy and Spain are expected to be the greatest beneficiaries of a proposed €750bn COVID-19 bailout, each eligible for around €170bn and €140bn respectively.
Madrid is expected to receive more than €77bn in grants and over €63bn in loans and this is despite Iglesias having called for the EU to step up or risk extinction last month.
Fears by bore fiscally conservative northern nations in the EU, such as the Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark and Austria that they will have to foot the bill for southern countries like Spain and Italy that are perceived as being financially more profligate has been one of the major stumbling blocks in recent negotiations, but it appears that Spain has got what it wanted.
Perhaps deep inside Brussels, MEPs and Commissioners know that they were too slow to react and failed to introduced an EU- wide programme to fight the pandemic as a united bloc instead of leaving member states to act alone - hence why once the situation eventually settles down, the EU is going to review its modus operandi and its economic and social policies.