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Spain Public Holidays 2012

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Bank and Public Holidays for Spain

Spain bank holidays, national holidays and public holidays for 2012, from the Q++ Worldwide Public Holidays Database, the professional source of international public holidays long trusted by the world's foremost diary publishers. The information on this page is provided for private, non-professional, use.

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12 Jan 2012 (ABC-Madrid) The government of Spain has reached an agreement with the Employers' Union (CEOE) and Labour Unions as to the 3 mid-week 2012 non-working public holiday would be moved to a nearby Monday, thus amending the previously released list of official national public holidays in Spain for 2012. • 29 Dec 2011 (Boletín Oficial de Navarra-BON) The Directora General de Trabajo y Prevención de Riesgos de Navarra has finally published the list of 2012 public holidays in Spain's Autonomous Región of Navarra. • 26 Nov 2011 (Dirección General de Trabajo-Consell de Govern) Spain's autonomous region of the Balears has finally gazetted its official calendar of 2012 regional and national public holidays (calendario laboral). • 05 Nov 2011 (Diari Oficial de la Comunitat Valenciana-Valencia) The Consell de la Generalitat Valenciana has published a decree listing the 2012 non-working public holidays (calendario laboral) in Spain's Autonomous Region of the Comunidad Valenciana. • 14 Oct 2011 (Boletín Oficial del Estado-BOE) The government of Spain has published the list of official national non-working public holidays (calendario laboral) in Spain for the upcoming calendar year 2012. • 08 Oct 2011 (Generalitat de Catalunya-Barcelona) The spokesperson for the Generalitat de Catalunya (Spain's Autonomous Region of Catalonia), Francesc Homs, has announced that the Government of Catalonia was favorable to the business community's recent proposal to move mid-week public holidays to the nearest Friday or Monday. • 24 Sep 2011 (Diario Oficial de Castilla-La Mancha-DOCM) The Consejo de Gobierno de Comunidad Autónoma de Castilla La-Mancha has published the list of 2012 public holidays (calendario laboral) in Spain's Autonomous Región of Castilla La-Mancha. • 20 Sep 2011 (El Faro-Ceuta) The president of the government of Spain's autonomous region of Ceuta has ruled-out the addition of a regional public holiday for the End of Ramadan (el final del Ramadán) in its list of official public holidays for the calendar year 2012. • 16 Sep 2011 (Consejo de Gobierno de la Comunidad de Madrid-Madrid) The Consejo de Gobierno de la Comunidad de Madrid has published the list of official 2012 non-working public holidays (calendario laboral) in Spain's Autonomous Comunidad de Madrid. • 02 Sep 2011 (Boletín Oficial de la Junta de Castilla y León-Valladolid) The Consejo de Gobierno de la Junta de Castilla y León has published the list of official regional public holidays (calendario laboral) in Spain's Comunidad Autónoma de Castilla y León for the calendar year 2012. • 12 Aug 2011 (Consejería de Economía y Hacienda del Gobierno de Cantabria -Santander) The Consejería de Economía y Hacienda del Gobierno de Cantabria has published the list of 2012 public holidays (calendario laboral) in Spain's Autonomous Region of Cantabria. • 29 Jul 2011 (Canarias Ahora-Santa Cruz De Tenerife) The Consejo de Gobierno of the regional government of Spain's autonomous region of las Islas Canarias, has announced the official list of 2012 regional public holidays (calendario laboral) in the Canaries Islands. • 02 Jul 2011 (Diario Oficial de Galicia-DOG) The government of Spain's Autonomous Region of Galicia has published the list of regional public holidays (calendario laboral) for 2012 in Galicia. • 11 Jun 2011 (Boletin Oficial De La Rioja-La Rioja) The Consejería de Industria, Innovación y Empleo of Spain's Autonomous Region of La Rioja has published the list of regional public holidays (calendario laboral) for 2012 in La Rioja. • 27 May 2011 (Diario Oficial de Extremadura-DOE) The Consejo de Gobierno de la Junta de Extremadura of Spain's Autonomous Region of Extremadura has published the list of regional public holidays (calendario laboral) for the calendar year 2012 in the Extremadura. • 26 May 2011 (Boletín Oficial de la Junta de Andalucía-BOJA) The Consejo de Gobierno de la Junta de Andalucía has published the list of 2012 public holidays (calendario laboral) in Spain's Autonomous Region of Andalucia • 21 May 2011 (Dirección General de Trabajo-Consell de Govern) Spain's autonomous region of the Balears has announced its official calendar of 2012 regional and national public holidays (calendario laboral). • 16 May 2011 (Diario Oficial de la Generalitat de Catalunya-DOGC) The Conselleria de Treball de la Generalitat de Catalunya has published the list of 2012 public holidays (calendario laboral) in Spain's Autonomous Region of Cataluña. • 27 Apr 2011 (Gobierno de Aragón-Zaragoza) The government of Spain's autonomous region of Aragon has announced its list of regional public holidays (calendario laboral) for 2012. • 12 Feb 2011 (ABC-Murcia) The executive of Spain's autonomous region of La Murcia has released its calendar of official public holidays (calendario laboral) for 2012. • More News Updates For the full version of the summarized news items above, and older news items not displayed above, go to the Spain public holidays news and updates page, or worldwide public holidays news and updates page, or subscribe to one of our free email newsletters.

Administrative Division: For the purpose of public holidays, Spain is divided into seventeen autonomous communities (comunidades autónomas), and two African autonomous cities (ciudades autónomas). Their abbreviations are: • • Andalucía (AN), • Aragón (AR), • Asturias (O), • Balearic Islands (IB), • Basque Country (PV), • Canary Islands (CN), • Cantabria (S), • Castilla-La Mancha (CM), • Castilla y León (CL), • Catalonia (CT), • Ceuta (CE), • Extremadura (EX), • Galicia (GA), • La Rioja (LO), • Madrid (M), • Melilla (ML), • Murcia (MU), • Navarra (NA), • Valencia (VC), • as set out in ISO 3166-2:ES . • National and Regional Public Holidays: Spanish regions, towns, villages and cities have additional public holidays of their own. There is a base of, usually 9, public holidays that are common to all regions of Spain, plus Epiphany and Maundy Thursday which each region can replace with one or two region-specific public holidays. Regions also have the option of adding a regional public holiday, without removing any of the common ones, or Epiphany and Maundy Thursday . • Epiphany: although it is, in theory, with Maundy Thursday, one of the 2 public holidays that each region can replace with another, in practice, over the last 30 years there has been only one occasion, in Catalonia, when Epiphany was not observed somewhere in Spain. • Maundy Thursday is not a public holiday in Catalonia. • Easter Monday is a public holiday in Catalonia, the Basque Region, Valencia, Navarra, and La Rioja. • Although Christmas Eve is not a public holiday, some shops and businesses may be closed or will close early on this day. • Saint Stephen's Day is a public holiday in Catalonia and the Balearic Islands. • Annual Selection of Regional Holidays: The main reason why the specific public holidays for each province and municipality change every year, is that these are usually patron saint days, which always occur on a fixed date. Therefore, when these fixed dates fall on a weekend, another holiday or patron saint is chosen for that year, to avoid "wasting" a holiday. • Note that 2 of the country-wide public holidays, Constitution Day and Immaculate Conception Day, are only one day apart (December 6 and 8). Therefore, certain years, depending on which days of the week these holidays occur, December 7 can become a de facto public holiday, with either businesses closing for the 3 days, or individuals taking the day off to make the bridge (hacer puente). • Weekend Public Holidays: Public holidays that occur on a weekend are not officially moved to the following Monday. • However, when a public holiday falls on a Thursday or Tuesday, it is common practice to "make the bridge" (hacer puente) by taking off the Friday or Monday so creating a very long weekend. When this happens you may find businesses running on short staff or smaller family run business closed for the full period . • Electoral law does not allow electoral polls to take place within 3 months of each other. • Spain International Codes ES and ESP (2 and 3-letter ISO3166 codes) and .es (ICANN national top-level internet domain). • Other Sources of Information The following specialized websites are also a good source of Spain information and news: Bank of Spain (Spain central bank), ASI Hot Spots (security-related world events: terrorist threats, political strife, strikes, criminal activity, aviation incidents and health outbreaks), CIA World Factbook (Spain maps, demographics and economic statistics), the IFES (information covering upcoming elections, referenda, electoral structures and voter participation in Spain), and Wikipedia (includes Spain commemorative dates that are not necessarily public holidays).

Observance : Any entry in the Observance column indicates that, in Spain, the holiday may be regional or non-official or limited to certain religious and/or linguistic groups, or begin at a time other than midnight. Note that religious holidays are included only if they are national public holidays, or if the national labour code has specific holiday allowances for employees of specific religions. For more information, see our pages on the religious calendars of the world.

Religious Holidays : Public holidays in Spain that are based on certain religious calendars may be subject to local variations due to differing interpretations between different religious authorities, or to seemingly arbitrary changes in the date a holiday is celebrated because it conflicts with another holiday that is based on another calendar, or because the day of the holiday is deemed inauspicious (bad luck). To find out more about these uncertainties, see the footnote below, if any, for each specific religion.

Muslim Holidays : Muslim bank holidays, legal holidays and public holidays for Spain were evaluated using the Umm al-Qura Calendar of Saudi Arabia which is used in Saudi Arabia and in most of the Persian Gulf States. Holidays may occur a day later in countries outside the Gulf region. The sunrises, sunsets, moon phases, moonrises and moonsets used in these calculations are based on the location of Mecca (latitude 21.42°N, longitude, 39.82°E, GMT+3 hours, no summer time rules). For more details on Muslim holidays, see Muslim Calendar Holidays. For Salat (prayer times) calculations, see our Freeware page.

Disclaimer
In many parts of the world, holidays are subject to arbitrary, last minute, changes by local authorities. While every effort has been made to present an accurate list of 2012 bank holidays, legal holidays and public holidays for Spain, we cannot accept any responsibility for any error or omission in the data presented above. You are therefore advised to verify the above dates with the embassy or consulate of Spain, before planning any trip to Spain. For last-minute updates to worldwide public holidays, visit our worldwide public holidays news and updates page or subscribe to our free email newsletters.