Preliminary draft organic law on public integrity

The Preliminary Draft Organic Law on Public Integrity is part of the State Plan for the Fight against Corruption, which provides it with regulatory effectiveness and temporal continuity, and forms part of a broader set of reforms currently in the pipeline aimed at strengthening public integrity. These complementary initiatives include the Draft Law on Transparency and Integrity of Stakeholders' Activities and the Preliminary Draft Law on Open Administration, which together aim to strengthen transparency, accountability and the prevention of corruption. Specific measures are also defined in terms of prohibition of contracting with the Public Administration, stiffer penalties for legal persons, as well as the need for a criminal compliance model.

The Preliminary Draft, approved on 17 February 2026 by the Council of Ministers (currently at the hearing and public information phase), is structured around fifteen measures distributed in five main areas: prevention, protection of informants, investigation and punishment, recovery of assets and promotion of a culture of democratic integrity.

The main innovations included are listed below:

1. Creation of a comprehensive public integrity system and an Independent Public Integrity Agency.

The Preliminary Draft introduces for the first time a unified and cross-cutting public integrity system, which will apply to the entire public sector and which transposes international commitments on the prevention and fight against corruption into domestic law. Although the core of the regulation is aimed at the public sector, the obligations and standards it incorporates have a direct impact on private entities related to it.

One of the main novelties of the Draft Bill is the creation of the Independent Public Integrity Agency, an independent administrative authority that assumes competences until now distributed among several state bodies (National Anti-Fraud Coordination Service, the Independent Whistleblower Protection Authority, the Conflict of Interest Office, as well as the Institutional Integrity Commission).

Among others, the Agency will have competences in investigation, whistleblower protection, drafting of recommendations, risk analysis, management of the external whistleblower channel and coordination with national and European bodies.

2. Measures in the area of public procurement

The Preliminary Draft substantially tightens public procurement requirements. Among others, it reinforces the transparency and traceability of procedures (publication of bids, scores, technical reports, minor contracts and emergency contracts), professionalises state contracting (training of the members of contracting boards and declarations of absence of conflicts of interest), and introduces additional compliance obligations for certain non-SME companies that contract with the Administration.

Likewise, the Draft Bill introduces the publication of the list of companies prohibited from contracting, which will enable any contracting body to know which companies are disqualified from contracting with public administrations.

3. Amendments to the Criminal Code

In line with the measures included in the State Plan to Combat Corruption, the Draft Bill introduces a significant toughening of penalties for legal persons for corruption offences and offences against public administration, including the following:

• It increases the severity of fines, which can now be set in proportion to the damage or illicit benefit, with higher daily quotas and new rules when the benefit cannot be calculated. The catalogue of penalties for the offences of bribery (Art. 427 bis), embezzlement (Art. 430 and 435) and trading in influence (Art. 433) is modified.
• The so-called "blacklisting" is incorporated into our legal system, whereby the public administration excludes the contracting of companies convicted of corruption.
• The penalty of disqualification from obtaining subsidies, aid or contracting with the public sector and from enjoying tax or Social Security benefits and incentives is extended to 20 years.
• It establishes new criteria for setting the amount of fines, which must be set exclusively on the basis of the economic situation of the legal person. This introduces a criterion of material proportionality that reinforces the dissuasive effect on larger companies, raising the Spanish standard to the level of other European countries such as the United Kingdom (Bribery Act).

4. Whistleblower protection

The Preliminary Draft reinforces the system of protection for informants, introducing improvements that complement Law 2/2023. In particular, it broadens the subjective scope of protection, recognising the status of protected person for five years after the cessation of their function (not only to those who have submitted communications, but also to those who have managed internal or external information channels).

The text also provides for whistleblowers to have the right to obtain compensation proportional to the damage suffered, including moral damage, in cases where reprisals have occurred.

Finally, the Draft provides that the Internal Reporting System should be integrated into the compliance or integrity system of the body or entity.

5. Conclusions

• The Draft Bill significantly raises the standards of integrity, control and transparency in the actions of the public sector, with a direct impact on all private operators related to the public sector.
• The creation of a state integrity system and an Independent Public Integrity Agency establishes a stricter framework for the prevention and supervision of corruption.
• The text introduces a significant tightening of the regime of criminal liability of legal persons for corruption offences and offences against public administration.
• The Preliminary Draft reinforces the protection regime for informants, extending the protection period to 5 years.

Information note prepared by the Compliance Department of ECIJA Madrid.