Whistle-blowers and audits: How Spain's PM vows to stamp out corruption

Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez this weekend outlined a package of new anti-corruption measures at a Socialist (PSOE) federal committee meeting. The new rules are intended to move the party past a series of scandals implicating high-profile political figures and family members of Sánchez himself.

Sánchez’s wife, brother, attorney general and two of his former right hand men are being investigated for influence peddling or corruption. The allegations against Begoña Gómez, Sánchez’s wife, and his brother, David Sánchez, have long been stuck in initial investigations and appear to be based on questionable legal cases.

READ ALSO: Spain's PM denies that ruling Socialists are funded by corruption

The so-called ‘Koldo’ scandal, however, which has so far led to the investigation of Sánchez's former Transport Minister José Luis Ábalos and the preventive imprisonment of former PSOE organisational secretary, Santos Cerdán, appears to be on a different legal level and has been incredibly damaging for Sánchez and his government.

The damning leaked recordings of Ábalos and Cerdán laid bare the kickback for public contracts schemes allegedly operating at the heart of Spain’s ruling Socialists. Investigations are ongoing but the recordings have put Sánchez’s judgment into question.

As such, faced with mounting calls to resign and call elections, Sánchez has attempted to take the problem head on, win some political oxygen and control the media narrative.

The proposed new anti-corruption rules come just as the Socialists rolled the headline-grabbing measures, a ban on party officials hiring sex workers.

READ ALSO: Spain ruling party bars members from hiring sex workers

The Socialists' new anti-corruption measures

Though the full raft of measures have not yet been announced, Sánchez outlined the main thrust of the new anti-corruption strategy that will be adopted by the PSOE.

A big part of this is strengthening “the balance of power within the party”, Sánchez said, promising more shared or co-held positions at the high ranks of the party to introduce a requirement of “double signatures” to “prevent an excessive concentration of power,” Sánchez said.

Sánchez also proposed regulating the maximum time limits for resolving disciplinary proceedings “with the obligation to act with the utmost diligence because the speed of these processes is the difference between success and failure,” he said, noting that the party took over a year to conclude the disciplinary proceedings against Ábalos.

The Prime Minister also teased new rules to “improve the governance of the party and guarantee its complete integrity” by creating new anti-corruption protocols.

“I propose drawing up an anti-fraud and anti-corruption protocol, an idea we have taken from the Catalonian Socialist party. It will incorporate new forms of control such as reports on compliance with tax obligations,” Sánchez explained. The Prime Minister also set a goal of updating the organisation's "transparency portal" before the end of the year so that all of this is publicly available.

Article 43 of the PSOE’s legal statutes will also be amended so that “declarations of assets are also submitted to the regional ethics and guarantees committees.” This will increase transparency, Sánchez suggested, so that committees can “forward them [declarations] to the federal committees, which may request updated information on assets, even on a random basis.”

He also told the party committee that the PSOE’s transparency rules should soon include “recommendations made to us in the latest reports” by auditors in order to publicly provide all the financial and budgetary information within the party.

Sánchez stressed as well that the party will guarantee the anonymity of potential whistle-blowers in order to “provide protection” and ensure that all party officials “have an obligation to report any irregularities within the PSOE.”

READ ALSO: Is Spain's opposition plotting to oust weakened PM soon?