The latest report of the group of states against corruption (Greco), integrated into the Council of Europe, confirms that Spain has partially implemented some improvements to prevent corruption since its last inspection, but regrets that it has not done so “satisfactorily” with any of the 19 recommendations it made although 16 of them have been partially implemented. He insists on requesting reforms on years or transparency around advisors and lobbies, emphasizing the lack of an anti -corruption strategy in the National Police and celebrating that future laws such as open administration and other measures of the regeneration plan are on the right track.
The Greco began to make recommendations to Spain in the field of struggle and prevention against corruption in public administration, then echoing the numerous cases of corruption that, in the case of Gürtel, led to the motion of censure that took the PP from the Moncloa. The list of 19 recommendations, related to conflicts of interest in high positions, lobbies, rotating doors, transparency and codes of conduct.
This group affirmed at the end of 2023 That Spain had not applied “fully” any of its recommendations, which includes legal changes that do it partially but not complete, and applied to Spain a non -compliance procedure to thoroughly supervise the evolution of these measures whose conclusions have been known this Friday. He grants that Spain has partially implemented 16 of the 19 measures, three more than the last time, but none completely.
“Spain has not satisfactorily implemented any of the 19 recommendations,” he criticizes. Of that total, 16 have been “partially implemented” and three “have not been implemented.” Spain, therefore, will have to continue responding to the Council for these measures and inform its development again in June 2026, within 11 months.
The report recognizes that some of the measures that are on their way, contained several of them in the 2024 democracy action plan such as the Open Administration Law, contribute good perspectives for the future in many loose points of the analysis, but points to measures still pending to implement. The first 2021 non -compliance report aimed seven ignored recommendations and in this last report the number has been reduced to three.
Lobbies, rotating doors and police corruption
The Greco detects three recommendations that have not been implemented even partially. The first is the one relating to the advisors and their transparency regime, something that does include the future Open Administration Law but, recalls the Council of Europe, has not yet been approved. But it does notice “positively” that it specifically regulates “the political nature” of the work of the advisors and the “need” to bring them closer to the “corruption prevention regime.”
Another of the points on which the focus is on this report is in the aforements and the need not to translate into impunity for politicians or members of the Government. It is perhaps the greatest disagreement between the Greco and Spain, since the State understands that the aforementation does not imply any type of impunity when judging and also sentenced to a defendant even if it is a parliamentary or member of the Executive.
The third point where the group does not see any advance is in the one related to the prevention of corruption in the National Police. They see improvements in terms of the Civil Guard but around the first body and to improve their “transparency, objectivity and proportionality” in their disciplinary regime. El Greco, as he has already made in previous reports, regrets “the absence of development in this area” and that the Spanish authorities “do not recognize it as a problem that needs to improve.”
In other measures, progress is found. Regarding the regulation of lobbies and pressure groups, for example, it celebrates that the future democratic regeneration plan includes, in its current phase, “key elements” such as the registration of interest groups, the communication of data of these groups with the territorial administrations and also the code of conduct and applicable sanctions. “It is a positive and long -awaited advance,” although he speaks of “lost opportunity” in terms of the transparency of the agendas.
Something similar happens with rotating doors. The regulations to come, still pending to approve in Spain, “reinforce the restrictions to the rotating doors”, for example forbidding that a politician returns to the private sector up to two years after leaving the administration. But Greco's recommendation, recalls the report, is “much greater.”