MADRID, March 2 (Reuters) - Spain is offering to delay social security payment obligations for companies in difficulty and waive them for up to three years when firms hire unemployed workers, the government said on Monday.
Companies that have problems in meeting their social security obligations will be able to delay the payments over 2009 and possibly for a further year, Spain's Labour Ministry said in a statement.
The actions are part of a package of six measures due to be presented to Spain's cabinet on Friday and come ahead of Tuesday's jobless data for February, which is expected to show that the number of unemployed in Spain has swelled to 3.5 million.
The government is already offering a 1,500-euro lump sum to companies that hire unemployed workers, and this measure is likely to shrink the surplus in Spain's social security system and widen the country's public deficit further.
Spain's public deficit reached 3.8 percent of GDP in 2008. (Reporting by Jonathan Gleave; Editing by Jonathan Oatis)