Opening remarks were delivered by Rosa Santos Fernández, Director of Employment, Diversity and Social Protection at the CEOE; Luis Enrique Fernández Pallarés, Employment, Compensation and Benefits partner at Pérez-Llorca; and Yolanda Valdeolivas García, Of Counsel in the same practice at the firm and Labour and Social Security Law lecturer at the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid.
Santos Fernández highlighted the strategic importance that remuneration policies have acquired in a context characterised by rising labour costs and regulatory uncertainty. “Companies need a regulatory framework that provides certainty and proportionality, and which enables them to tailor their remuneration policies to their specific circumstances.”
Fernández Pallarés then spoke, focusing on the implications that the arrival of new European legislation on pay transparency will have for businesses, which is particularly significant given the delay in its incorporation into Spanish law and the issues that remain unresolved. “The Directive’s incorporation into Spanish law adds new obligations to an already highly complex area. It is particularly important to combine technical and legal analysis with a practical and strategic approach that enables companies to anticipate developments and adapt their remuneration policies accordingly,” he explained.
Valdeolivas emphasised the importance of legal advisers playing an active role in the debate on the regulatory changes that are transforming the labour market, while keeping in mind the issues that truly concern businesses and workers. She stressed that “remuneration can no longer be understood solely in terms of salary. We’re talking about flexible working hours, work-life balance, employee benefits and an ever-widening range of factors. Compliance is an essential part of this, but it is not enough on its own.”
This was followed by a round-table discussion on the regulatory framework governing pay and the impact of European directives yet to be incorporated into Spanish law, moderated by Daniel Cifuentes, partner in Pérez-Llorca’s Employment, Compensation and Benefits practice, with contributions from Raquel Vicente Andrés, a specialist judge in the Labour Chamber of the High Court of Madrid and associate professor of Labour Law and Social Security at UNED, and Paloma Urgorri, an inspector and equality coordinator at the Labour and Social Security Inspection Authorities in Madrid.
During the round-table discussion, some of the key changes arising from the transposition of Directive (EU) 2023/970 were examined, including the workforce thresholds for the application of certain obligations, the assessment of pay gaps between men and women, and the scope of employees’ right to information. Cifuentes highlighted the change introduced by the European legislation regarding the analysis of pay gaps: whereas the current Spanish framework has a 25% threshold for certain obligations to provide justification, the Directive introduces a 5% threshold to trigger new requirements for a joint assessment when the conditions set out in the legislation are met.
Vicente Andrés focused on the scope of the draft implementing law and, in particular, on the Spanish legislature’s decision to go beyond some of the minimum requirements set out in European legislation. “The Directive sets out certain reporting obligations for organisations with 100 or more employees, while the Spanish draft bill proposes setting that threshold at 50. It is a significant difference because it increases the number of companies that would be subject to these requirements,” he explained. He also noted that this is still a draft and that, therefore, the final text may be subject to changes.
From the Labour and Social Security Inspection Authorities’ perspective, Urgorri highlighted the practical implications of greater transparency and the need to distinguish between different pay and discrimination on the grounds of sex. “A pay gap does not necessarily mean that there is discrimination, but companies will have to analyse their pay structures in much greater depth and be able to explain which objective factors justify those differences,” she said. In this regard, Urgorri also addressed workers’ right to request information on pay, noting that, as a general rule, exercising this right does not require prior justification of the request, provided that the request is not made in an abusive manner.
Javier Pacheco, the Workers’ Commissions’ confederal secretary for Trade Union Action and Strategic Transitions, then offered a trade union perspective on the legal and collective framework governing pay and remuneration policies, in a discussion moderated by Yolanda Valdeolivas.
Pacheco placed the development of wage policies within the context of a European Union seeking to move towards greater social convergence, with initiatives such as the Minimum Wage Directive and a stronger focus on collective bargaining. “Europe is bolstering the collective framework, and trade union representatives have a key role to play in ensuring these changes are implemented within companies,” he said.
Pacheco also highlighted the loss of purchasing power and the impact of recent wage trends: “An increase in the lowest wages was necessary, but this has not been reflected with the same intensity at other levels, thereby narrowing the differences between professional categories.” Against this backdrop, he also called for greater transparency regarding how salaries are determined and how employees progress in their careers and in terms of pay.
Lastly, Valdeolivas opened the discussion on the growing use of flexible remuneration schemes and their acceptance among employees. Pacheco acknowledged the cultural shift that these schemes represent, but warned that flexible remuneration should complement the salary and not replace a pay rise. “The problem arises when certain benefits are made universal at the expense of pay rises,” she concluded.
The final discussion of the event focused on the latest trends and business challenges relating to flexible remuneration, allowances, incentives and employee benefits. Moderated by Luis Enrique Fernández Pallarés and Yolanda Valdeolivas, it featured Jesús Izcue Irigoyen, Chief Human Resources Officer at ArcelorMittal in Spain, and Armando Ugarriza Capdevila, Head of Remuneration and Pensions Policy at Iberdrola.
Valdeolivas began the discussion on variable remuneration by referring to a recent Spanish Supreme Court judgement of 17 February 2026 (STS 165/2026) concerning performance appraisal and variable remuneration, emphasising the need to ensure the traceability of the criteria used and their link to productivity. Building on this point, Ugarriza argued in favour of moving towards what he termed ‘retributive explainability’: “We need to move away from mere formalities and be able to explain, using objective criteria, why there are different levels of pay. When properly understood, transparency is an opportunity to build trust and provide the backbone of the company.”
Izcue went on to emphasise the need to devise policies capable of responding to an increasingly diverse workforce while, at the same time, fostering a sense of commitment to the organisation that goes beyond pay. “A single company brings together very varied professional profiles, and the challenge is to strike a balance between a common remuneration policy and the flexibility needed to respond to different circumstances,” he said. He also emphasised that performance appraisals must be linked to realistic, achievable and measurable objectives, taking into account the differences between roles and professional profiles.
In this regard, Ugarriza emphasised the possibility of tailoring certain elements of the remuneration package to the needs of each individual professional. “It’s not about paying more, but about paying better,” he said. He also explained that flexibility involves offering alternatives that allow each employee to choose the remuneration package that best suits their needs, and highlighted health insurance as one of the benefits that employees have come to value particularly highly in recent years.