Good administration and transparency in management of the COVID-19 crisis in Spain

Subject: Good administration and transparency in management of the COVID-19 crisis in Spain

Spain’s Ministry of Health refused recently to reveal the identity of the 12 people making up the Technical Committee that will decide how to manage the de escalation of measures imposed during the COVID-19 state of emergency. It contended that it wanted to avoid the people managing this situation being subjected to ‘pressure’ and allow them to work ‘freely’.

Spain has a Transparency Law to guarantee that the right to good administration is respected. This is a right recognised in the Charter of Fundamental Rights and EU case-law and which Member States must abide by when they act within the scope of EU law.

The EU has adopted specific legislation to overcome this crisis, and which the Member States are implementing. The Commission needs to be vigilant and ensure that the crisis caused by COVID-19 is not used to cut back on consolidated transparency standards.

1. Does the Commission believe that in not making the identity of these people known, Spain may have infringed its citizens’ right to good administration and may be failing in its duty of transparency in public administrations?

2. Will the Commission include this matter in its planned assessment of the measures Member States adopted in relation to COVID-19?

Answer given by Mr Reynders on behalf of the European Commission

(9 November 2020)

The Commission is monitoring the emergency measures taken in all Member States, including in Spain, as regards their impact, in particular on the rule of law, on fundamental rights, and on EC law.

Emergency measures must be limited to what is necessary, strictly proportionate, clearly restricted in time, and in line with constitutionally enshrined safeguards, as well as European and international standards.

Measures restricting fundamental rights are now being gradually removed or replaced by more targeted and less intrusive ones. The Commission will continue to monitor such measures until they are all lifted and remains very vigilant on whether they are adequately phased out.

The right to good administration is enshrined in Article 41 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the EU (1). However, the Charter only applies to Member States when they are implementing EC law, in line with its Article 51(1). The cases referred to by the Honourable Member do not appear to be related to the implementation of European Union law.

In such cases, it is for the Member States, including their judicial authorities, to ensure that fundamental rights are effectively respected in accordance with their national legislation and international human rights obligations.

⋅1∙ https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX:12012P/TXT | | ( | | )