Subject: Spain’s transposition of Directive (EU) 2019/1152 on transparent and predictable working conditions in the European Union
Under the legislation in force, Directive (EU) 2019/1152 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 June 2019 on transparent and predictable working conditions in the European Union, should have been transposed into Spanish law no later than 1 August 2022.
However, the Directive has still not been transposed, and Spain is the only Member State that has not yet notified the Commission of its national transposition measures.
In light of the above:
1. In the Commission’s view, how does the failure to transpose the Directive diminish workers’ rights?
2. Has the Commission adopted, or does it intend to adopt, measures to ensure that the Directive is transposed into Spanish law?
Submitted: 21.1.2025
Answer given by Executive Vice-President Mînzatu on behalf of the European Commission (24 March 2025)
Transposition of directives into national legal orders is essential to ensure that citizens in Member States enjoy the rights conferred upon them by the directives, including workers’ rights.
In this case, the failure by Spain to transpose Directive (EU) 2019/1152 (1) in time means that Spain lacks a set of measures to confer on workers the rights enshrined under this directive.
These are, among others, the right to be informed in writing on their basic working conditions at the start of their employment relationship and a number of minimum working conditions requirements (such as maximum duration of the probationary period, right to parallel employment or the right to have minimum predictability at work).
For this reason, in September 2022, the Commission opened an infringement proceeding against Spain (2) for failing to communicate national transposition measures, by addressing a letter of formal notice to the Spanish authorities. In June 2023, the Commission further adopted a reasoned opinion against Spain.
The Commission is currently in a dialogue with the Spanish authorities concerning the state of transposition of the directive into Spanish legislation. A decision on the next step in the procedure will be taken in due course.
1 ∙ ⸱ OJ L 186, 11.7.2019, p. 105-121, https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/dir/2019/1152/oj/eng
2 ∙ ⸱ https://ec.europa.eu/atwork/applying-eu-law/infringements-proceedings/infringement_decisions/?
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