The Government announced today that it is to invest €8 million in its Strategy for Restructuring Support Services in Public Administration and create a Citizens' Shop in each and every municipality in the country, according to the Deputy Minister of Regional Development.

Poiares Maduro said that this plan, when executed, will enable that citizens will have greater access to public services while saving the government money by centralising services on a council-wide basis thus reducing staff and property costs.

Portuguese Commercial Bank (Millennium BCP) has repaid €400 million of public money, around 13.3% of the total €3 billion that the bank received to stop it closing in 2012.

The CEO, Nuno Amado, says the bank will keep repayments coming, in line with an agreed plan which predicted that repayments would begin this year.

Environmental association Quercus and the Algarve Trade and Commerce Association both have strongly opposed the inadequate environmental impact study presented by Swedish multinational IKEA in support of its planning application for a retail park near Loulé.

Today sees the end of the public consultation period, and the two associations have expressed “outrage and disgust" and propose that the impact study should be rejected for many reasons, the main one being that the study, unsurprisingly, only looks at the economic benefits of the scheme and does not dwell on the impact to the environment.

The British taxman must be laughing after having collected an extra £1billion by taking a closer look at middle class professionals, such as barristers, solicitors, and accountants.

New figures show 2,650 people were prosecuted in the last four years for failing to pay tax, including “very high profile barristers, accountants and lawyers”, according to HM Revenue and Customs.

EU election results in Spain broke the hold of the two major parties for the first time.

The Ruling conservatives (Popular Party) and the opposition (Socialist Party) have traditionally shared more than 80% of the vote.

The number of mortgages being approved in the UK has begun to fall, with a drop of 5% in April.

Some 71,238 people were approved for a mortgage in April, down from 75,853 in March. This was down significantly from a six-monthly average of almost 76,800.

A new barometer published today looking at the level of insecurity among the remaining Portuguese population, the primary reason for worry and fear is, unsurprisingly, unemployment.
 
The 2014 Barometer analysed responses from 813 respondents from Lisbon, Oporto, Coimbra, Évora and Faro and 76% agreed, the fear of unemployment is the most important factor that contributed to their perception of insecurity in the country.

Over 90% of Portuguese beaches have 'excellent' water quality according to a report from the European Environment Agency and the European Commission which puts Portugal in sixth place in the league of member states.

The study looked at water quality in more than 22,000 bathing sites at beaches, rivers and lakes across Europe but the story is not so good for Portugal’s inland waterways used for bathing where of the 514 beaches analysed only 60% were classified as having excellent water.