The European Commission has opened a file against Spain for not adequately remunerating the eight weeks of parental leaveas communicated this Thursday by the Community Executive. On this point, Brussels has sent a letter of formal notice to the Government for not having fully incorporated into its national law the provision regarding the payment of the subsidy for the last two weeks of parental leave, as required by Directive 2019/1158 on the reconciliation of work and family life.
This Directive establishes rMinimum requirements aimed at achieving equality between men and women with regard to opportunities in the labour market and treatment at work, facilitating the reconciliation of work and family life for workers who are parents or carers. The Directive entered into force in July 2019, with two separate transposition deadlines. Member States had until 2 August 2022 to transpose most of the provisions of the Directive into their national legislation, for example the provision to provide the right to two months of non-transferable and adequately paid parental leave.
The provision on payment of the last two weeks of parental leave, however, had to be transposed by Member States by 2 August 2024. As of today, Spain has not notified the Commission of the full transposition of this provision into its national law. The Commission is therefore sending a letter of formal notice to Spain, which now has two months to respond and remedy the deficiencies raised by the Commission. In the absence of a satisfactory response, the Commission may decide to issue a reasoned opinion.
Brussels has done the same for 17 Member States (Belgium, Czech Republic, Germany, Estonia, Greece, Spain, Cyprus, Latvia, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Austria, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovenia and Finland) for notifying their national measures fully transposing the Accounting Directive (Directive 2013/34/EU), the Transparency Directive (Directive 2004/109/EC) and the Audit Directive (Directive 2014/56/EU).
This is the regulation that requires large companies and publicly traded companies (excluding micro-enterprises) to disclose information on the social and environmental risks they face and on the impact of their activities on people and the environment.This helps investors and other stakeholders assess companies’ sustainability performance. The new sustainability reporting rules will apply from financial years beginning on or after 1 January 2024,” the Commission summarises. “If these new rules are not transposed, it will not be possible to achieve the necessary level of transparency. harmonisation of sustainability reporting in the EU and investors will not be able to take into account sustainability results of companies when making investment decisions,” he concludes.
Spain has had another case opened since Thursday for not having fully incorporated into national legislation the provisions of the revised Directive on renewable energies relating to the simplification and acceleration of permit granting procedures.
The revised DER (Directive 2023/2413 amending Directive 2018/2001) entered into force in November 2023 and certain provisions were to be transposed into national law by 1 July 2024. These provisions include measures to simplify and speed up procedures for granting permits for both renewable energy projects as well as for the infrastructure projects needed to integrate additional renewable energy into the electricity system.
They also include clear timelines for permitting procedures targeting specific technologies or project types, the strengthening of the role of the one-stop shop for applications and the presumption that renewable energy projects and the related network infrastructures are of overriding public interest. To date, only Denmark has notified the full transposition of these provisions before the legal deadline of 1 July 2024.
The Commission is therefore sending letters of formal notice to Belgium, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Germany, Estonia, Ireland, Greece, Spain, France, Croatia, Italy, Cyprus, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Hungary, Malta, the Netherlands, Austria, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovenia, Slovakia, Finland and Sweden. They now have two months to respond and complete their transposition.In the absence of a satisfactory response, the Commission may decide to issue a reasoned opinion as the final part of the entire process.
