After a dispute lasting more than five years, Spain's ruling Socialists (PSOE) and the largest opposition party, the conservative People's Party (PP), have reached an agreement, mediated by the EU, on the replacement of key judicial posts.
Spain's Socialist Justice Minister Félix Bolaños and conservative member of the European Parliament (MEP) Esteban González Pons reached the agreement with the support of European Commission Vice-President Věra Jourová in Brussels on Tuesday.
"It is a great day for our democracy and for our rule of law," Bolaños told journalists in Brussels.
Due to the blockade, the General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ) had only been in office on an acting basis since 2018 and many judicial posts could not be filled. The two parties have now agreed on a list of names for the future members of the CGPJ, state TV channel RTVE reported.
The agreement came just before the expiry of an ultimatum that Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez had given the PP. If no agreement had been reached by Sunday, the government planned to introduce a law that would have withdrawn the authority to appoint judges to the supreme courts from the CGPJ, which now only holds executive power.
The judicial dispute was about overcoming the blockade in the renewal of posts in the CGPJ. The EU had repeatedly called on Spain to resolve the dispute swiftly.
The CGPJ is a judicial control council which also appoints the judges of the supreme courts. It is authorized to elect two members of the Constitutional Court.
Conservatives have held the majority on the council since the times when the PP was in power. In 2018, the PP lost power and had to go into opposition. Since then, it has tried to maintain the conservative majority in the CGPJ.
As recommended by the European Commission in its report on the rule of law in Spain for the years 2022 and 2023, the agreement includes the decision to press ahead with the immediate renewal of the CGPJ and to present a proposal for an organic law to strengthen the independence of the judiciary and, finally, to appoint a new judge to the Constitutional Court.
This should be approved at a plenary session of the Congress of Deputies in July.
Twelve of the 20 members of the CGPJ are nominated by the judges and must be confirmed by parliament with a 60% majority, while the remaining eight are elected directly by parliament without any input from the judges. This procedure gives political parties considerable influence over the judiciary.
