The High-Level Expert Committee on Democracy at Work, convened by the Vice President and Minister of Labor of Spain, Yolanda Díaz, and the Secretary of State for Employment, Joaquín Perez Rey in February 2025, published a report in February 2026 that outlines how Spain is in the midst of an economic and ecological crisis, how democratising the Spanish economy through expanding worker voice and ownership could contribute to resolving this crisis and what legislation and policies could realise this.
A summary of the report’s recommendations (from the report’s website) can be found below:
KEY RECOMMENDATIONS
The Expert Committee on Democracy at Work recommends that the Spanish Government and its social partners implement the following strategic approach, designed to transform Spanish firms into Europe’s most participatory and innovative organizations. This strategy promotes labor investors’ participation structured around the two complementary pillars identified in Article 129.2: voice and ownership and provides tools and recommendations for use at the national and European levels.
VOICE
- Reinforcement and new legal requirements for worker participation in company operational decisions, including reinforcing the prerogatives of Works Councils and Employee Delegates in particular with a new Co-decision Right to Shape and Consent to the deployment of AI at work
- Inclusion of workers in strategic decisions via Boards, with minimum statutory thresholds designed in alignment with, and seek to advance upon, European best practices in codetermination (1/3 of workers on board seats for firms with employees between 50 and 1000 employees, beyond 1000 employees: 1/2 of workers on board seats)
OWNERSHIP
- Minimum statutory thresholds starting with opening access to 2% of share ownership to workers.
- New Citizens’ Funds designed to acquire shares and accelerate the transfer in order to make Spanish firms more resilient, and less dependent on extractive financial actors, and a transition plan supported by new ESOP-type financing mechanism for workers to acquire their company’ shares in anticipation of a founder or owner’s retirement
IMPLEMENTATION: A Dynamic Incentive-based Trajectory for Every FirmBeyond minimum legal compliance, the government should put in place mechanisms to encourage firms to progress along the proposed trajectory. To this end the Committee has proposed a new reporting tool, the Corporate Democratic Development Index, based on two Participation Scoring Scales that measure labor investors’ access to voice and ownership. Data collected from the Corporate Democratic Development Index will then be used for a bonus/malus incentive-based mechanism designed to reward further levels of access to voice and ownership (and discourage lower levels). It will steer a policy framework which will mobilize public subsidies, corporate tax rates, fiscal benefits, privileged access to public procurement etc. to incentivize further progress on this regenerative path to public procurement etc. to incentivize further progress.
You can read the report here.