Frente Amplio has put on the table a broad package of proposals for democratic regeneration that includes expanding the incompatibility up to 10 years —from the current two— so that former Government presidents can be incorporated into the private sector, putting an end to the well-known so-called “revolving doors,” preventing companies involved in corruption plots from signing contracts with the administration for 20 years, and strengthening the functions of the Office for the Recovery and Management of Assets in cases of corruption.
In addition, they recover initiatives already advocated by Sumar in the previous legislature, such as the creation of a specific agency for the prevention of corruption, an agency that did not come to be constituted after the Public Integrity Law fell following the election call.
These measures have been presented at an event in Madrid in which the Frente Amplio candidate for the Presidency in the elections of 29N, Ada Colau, participated, accompanied by the spokesperson for Más Madrid in the City Council of the capital, Rita Maestre, the coalition candidate for Barcelona, Júlia Miralles, and the jurist Javier Pérez-Royo.
Specifically, Sumar proposes excluding from public contracting for 20 years companies related to corruption cases through a reform of the Law on Contracts in the Public Sector (Article 72,6) and of the Criminal Code (Article 33,7), a veto that would also apply when these companies form part of a Temporary Business Union (UTE).
During her speech, the candidate for the Moncloa has denounced that corruption has been used to “discredit” the public and to fuel “anti-politics,” and for that reason she considers it essential “to restore its prestige” to institutions, which must be “strong and exemplary,” and to guarantee a “clean and honest” policy.
Criticism of the two-party system and the end of the revolving doors
Colau has claimed that her political space has not been involved in corruption scandals despite her extensive government experience in different institutions and has emphasized that this scourge is concentrated fundamentally in the “two-party system,” that is, in PP and PSOE, although in her view the ‘populars’ accumulate more plots.
In this context, she has defended raising standards of institutional transparency and reviewing in depth contracting with the private sector, where the main corruptors, illegal commissions to public officeholders, or irregular urban planning operations arise.
She has also insisted on the need to put an end to the “revolving doors” that, in her view, have benefited “two-party rule,” underscoring that politics must maintain real “independence” from the large economic groups.
Among the measures she draws from her time as mayor of Barcelona, Colau has mentioned strengthening protection for those who report cases of corruption and launching an independent agency with sufficient resources and effective policies to prevent these practices.
“Light and transcripts” and punishment for those who corrupt
“There must be light and transcripts, spotlights, and the requirement for accountability without any considerations,” she said, to emphasize that action also has to be taken against those who corrupt, calling for the prohibition of corrupting companies with the public administration at least for 20 years.
“It can’t be that, in practice, those who have carried out corruption are pardoned by paying commissions and buying favors from the private sector. We have to be inflexible with corrupt people from the political sphere, but we also have to be equally inflexible with those who have wanted to corrupt the public,” she added.
New law on public integrity and control of former government officials
For her part, Miralles defended the need to resume a law on public integrity — after the fall of the previous project due to the dissolution of the Cortes — that would contribute “legally to lifting the corporate veil” and that “no one should hide behind extremely complex corporate plots that even judges themselves sometimes are not capable of investigating.”
“You always have to know who we call the ultimate beneficiary, the final owner of the companies, and therefore the one who ultimately benefits when we find those corruption plots that involve private companies,” he reasoned.
Likewise, she called for strengthening the Office for the Recovery and Management of Assets in order to improve the forfeiture of assets suspected of coming from corrupt networks.
The coalition also commits to recovering the bill proposal registered by Sumar in the previous legislature to reform the statute for former presidents of the Government, extending to 10 years the ban on working in private companies after leaving office, compared with the two years that are in effect today.
Miralles has added that his goal is that all the public media that they have available for the work of former presidents for their institutional and diplomatic work be “immediately withdrawn when they begin to carry out a lucrative private activity,” citing as an example the offices and support staff.
“It cannot be that we are financing people who, instead of devoting themselves to promoting their public activity, which of course can make sense, when one engages in the private sector, that they should not continue to use public resources,” he added.
To conclude, the Frente Amplio candidate emphasized the urgency of approving a “lobbies” law as an indispensable tool for Spain when it comes to regulating the influence of interest groups on political decisions.