President Raul Castro said Saturday that Cuba will cut spending on education and health care, potentially weakening the building blocks of its communist system in a bid to revive a foundering economy.

Castro, the former defense minister who took over the presidency last year, called state spending "simply unsustainable" and said the government would reorganize rural schools and scrutinize its free health care system in search of ways to save money.

But he vowed that the island will not see fundamental change to its communist system, even after he and his older brother and predecessor, Fidel Castro, are gone.

"I wasn't elected president to return capitalism to Cuba, or to surrender the revolution," Raul Castro said to a standing ovation from lawmakers in Parliament.

While insisting that education will not suffer, he said some students and teachers in rural areas will be reassigned to nearby cities, saving time and money needed to transport educators long distances between home and work.

He also said cuts were in store for the universal health care system, which, along with free education through college, subsidized housing and food forms the basis of the communist way of life.

Three hurricanes last summer caused more than $10 billion in damage and wiped out grain that the government had stockpiled to protect against rising commodity prices. The global recession has since cut into export earnings and caused budget deficits to soar.

Castro reiterated his willingness to negotiate better relations with the United States, but he said Cuba "won't negotiate our political or social system, and we won't ask the United States to do so."

Source: Dallas News