Madrid, 28 November 2013 – The Spanish Parliament today adopted the Law on Transparency, Access to Information and Good Governance, the first law of its kind in Spain. The Coalición Pro Acceso regrets that final text is insufficient, given its serious shortcomings and contradictions, making the law obsolete from the outset and far from meeting international standards.

The law will be adopted on 28 November 2013 but will enter into force only after one year at the national level and two years at the regional level Madrid, 26 November 2013 – The Spanish Law on Transparency, Access to Information and Good Governance was approved by the Senate last Wednesday with no improvements to the right of access to information, despite the rejection of the text from the majority of parliamentary groups. The following political groups and parties voted against the law: ERC, AMAIUR, IU, ENTESA PROGRES PER CATALUNYA y PSOE. “The ruling Partido Popular has ignored civil society

– Companies have asked to plant test GM crops in 40 locations in Castilla y León out of 62 in total across Spain – Civil society organisations report that the Spanish Government gave the information when most of the experiments had already finished Valladolid, 13 November 2013 – Amigos de la Tierra, Access Info Europe, COAG, Plataforma Rural and Red de Semillas have today published a map with the exact loaction of the GMO test fields in Spain [1]. The Spanish government has released the information outside legal timeframes, when the majority of the tests had been

Madrid, 4 October 2013 – With Spain’s future transparency law open for amendments in the Senate until 8 October, Access Info has launched a last campaign for improvements. The goal is to strengthen the law’s score of 68 out of 150 on the RTI Rating, and a future position number 75 out of 96 laws globally.

Madrid, 26 de septiembre de 2013 – El día 28 de septiembre es el Día Internacional del Derecho a Saber y lo queremos celebrar. España está aprobando en estos momentos una Ley de Transparencia (¡por fin!) y la sociedad civil está siguiendo este proceso muy de cerca para conseguir que esa norma esté a la altura de las mejores leyes del mundo.

Madrid, 10 September 2013 – Access Info Europe has again warned that the current version of the Spanish transparency law does not meet international standards. The law will be approved by the Parliament on Thursday 12 September, it will then be passed to the Senate for approval. When adopted, Spain would rank 72nd out of 96 countries with access to information laws, obtaining 70 points from a total of 150 on the Global RTI-Rating. In the upcoming debate, the parliament is expected to approve amendments to the transparency law adopted by the Constitutional Committee on 31 July 2013. These amendments

Madrid, 31 July 2013 – The Constitutional Commission of Spain’s Parliament (Congress) today adopted using the voting majority of the ruling Partido Popular and two smaller parties, the draft law on Transparency, Access to Information and Good Governance. This will be passed to the plenary of the parliament in September for subsequent approval by the Senate, most likely to come during the autumn.

Madrid, 26 July 2013 – Access Info Europe today criticised once again the process by which Spain’s transparency law is being adopted, which continues to be secretive and non-participatory. In the latest development, on Thursday 25 July, with domestic and international attention focused on the news of Spain’s tragic train crash, a closed door session of the Parliament’s Constitutional Commission which was boycotted by left of centre parties, including the main opposition Socialist Party, approved amendments to the transparency law.