The PSOE and the PP have each chosen ten names to form the new General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ). The body will thus be renewed after five and a half years of political deadlock, as these names will be endorsed by Congress and the Senate, with a three-fifths majority, because the votes of the Socialists and the PP will be sufficient.
The new General Council of the Judiciary will have to appoint – by at least 12 votes – the president of the Supreme Court, and within half a year it will have to draw up a proposal to reform the method of appointing members of the CGPJ, which will allow for the participation of the judiciary in the appointments of its highest governing body.
The two parties have also agreed to put an end to the revolving doors between politics and the judiciary, with a minimum of two years to move from one to the other, and to appoint José María Macías, currently a member of the CGPJ, as a new magistrate of the Constitutional Court.
The Government has welcomed the agreement and the PP claims that if the PSOE had accepted these conditions two years ago, the CGPJ would have been renewed in October 2022. For her part, the EU vice-president who has acted as mediator, Vera Jourová, was also pleased that it has finally been possible to unblock the renewal of the governing body of judges in Spain, and that normality has been restored.
