MADRID, Jan 25 (Reuters) – Racial and ethnic discrimination in Spain has worsened in the past few years, with a notable drop in access to housing, the Equality Ministry said in its 2020 report on Monday.

It also highlighted growing racism in the education sphere.

Almost one in three Black or ethnic minority respondents said they had experienced discrimination while house-hunting, starting with real estate and housing agencies and extending to locals and individual landlords. That was double over the previous report in 2013,

Discrimination in the educational sector increased by more than 50% from 2013, with one in five respondents saying they had endured insults, assault and racist jokes from fellow students, and been excluded from games and activities.

People from sub-Saharan Africa and Spain’s Roma community, known locally as Gitano, experienced the highest levels of racism based on their physical aspect – 82% and 71% for the respective demographics.

A United Nations expert said last year that Spain’s discriminated-against communities suffer staggeringly high rates of disease, inequality, and poor access to education and housing.

Religion-related discrimination also increased considerably, the report said, with North African and Indo-Pakistani communities hardest-hit as a result of growing stigmatisation, Islamophobia and being likened to terrorists, the report said.

(Reporting by Clara-Laeila Laudette, editing by Andrei Khalip and Angus MacSwan)

(c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2021. Click For Restrictions – https://agency.reuters.com/en/copyright.html