Document boxes in the archives of the General Administration in Alcalá de Henares (Madrid). Alvaro Garcia
The third time should be the charm. The plenary session of Congress approved this Tuesday, for the third time in the last eight years, the examination of a bill from the PNV to reform the Franco law on official secrets. The PNV bill was approved with 176 votes in favor and 169 against. All political groups except PP and Vox have agreed to the start of a process that does not guarantee a successful outcome. In fact, on the two previous occasions, 2016 and 2020, the initiative failed due to the dissolution of the Cortes after the PP and PSOE blocked its treatment in the congressional table by extending indefinitely the deadline for submitting amendments. “Let us trust that all groups work this way.” [la nueva ley] become a reality,” said socialist spokesman Juan Carlos Jerez.
PNV spokesman Mikel Legarda recalled that his group had presented the same proposal for several legislative periods and expressed doubts that the government actually had the will to repeal a law passed and revised in 1968 in the middle of the dictatorship for ten years later, before the constitution was adopted. After being open to changing the automatic clearance periods provided for in its text – 25 years, exceptionally extendable for a further ten years for classified matters; and ten non-renewable years for the reserved – he has not hidden that his aim is for the government to “get on the reform bandwagon”. Nevertheless, he has proposed with his own proposal, as he did in August 2022, when he presented a bill on classified information, he was frustrated because he already had all the mandatory reports due to the upcoming elections.
Junts spokeswoman Miariam Nogueras also took this opportunity to call for a reform of the law on judicial control of the secret service. “We can say that there are Supreme Court judges who are part of the staff of the CNI,” he added. The only one who explicitly spoke out against the initiative was the Vox MP José María Sánchez García, who attributed an “obsession” “of the PNV for its efforts to repeal the Franco law, which is still in force, and has accused him of that he wanted to deprive the military authorities of the ability to declare matters secret, a power which in reality they no longer have.
The spokesman of the PP, Carlos Rojas, has acknowledged that the law on official secrets needs to be reformed to improve the security of citizens, stressing that “without a doubt” it is necessary to have a debate on the issue “on the basis of Consensus and Responsibility” In the end, he announced the opposite vote of his group because he did not believe that “the mere passage of time” could lead to the release of secrets. On the previous two occasions the PP abstained from voting. This is the first time he has voted against it. The difference may be that there are less than two months until the elections in the Basque Country and this is a PNV initiative.
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