Joaquín Almunia

Joaquín Almunia (2007)

Joaquín Almunia Amann [ xo.aˈkin alˈmunja ] (born June 17, 1948 in Bilbao ) is a Spanish politician. From 2004 to 2014 he was a member of the European Commission , where he has been responsible for the competition department since 2010 .

Life

After studying law and economics at the Deusto University in Bilbao ( Basque Country ), he completed postgraduate studies in Paris . He then worked as an assistant professor and professor of labor law at the University of Alcalá de Henares and later at Harvard University .

In 1974 he joined the then banned Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE) underground and worked for the PSOE-affiliated UGT union. After entering the Spanish Parliament in 1979 for the PSOE, he was Minister of Labor from 1982 to 1986 and Minister of Public Administration from 1986 to 1991 in the government of Felipe González .

In 1991 Almunia resigned from government and parliament and initially worked at the university again. In 1994 he returned to parliament and in 1997 became general secretary of the PSOE (which roughly corresponds to a German party leader ). As such, he was also the PSOE top candidate in the Spanish parliamentary elections in 2000 , in which he suffered a heavy electoral defeat against the Partido Popular under Prime Minister José María Aznar . Almunia therefore resigned on the evening of the election, and his successor as General Secretary of the PSOE was José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero .

On April 26, 2004, Almunia became European Commissioner for Economic and Monetary Affairs in the Prodi Commission at the suggestion of Zapatero, who has meanwhile been elected head of the Spanish government . He succeeded Pedro Solbes , who in turn was appointed Spanish Minister of Economic Affairs. Almunia kept his portfolio in the Barroso I Commission , which was in office from November 18, 2004 to February 9, 2010. On November 27, 2009 Almunia was proposed by Commission President José Manuel Barroso as Commissioner for Competition and Vice-President of the future Barroso II Commission. He held this office from February 10, 2010 to October 31, 2014.

Joaquín Almunia is married and has two children.

EU Competition Commissioner

Joaquin Almunia has been the EU Commissioner for Competition and Vice President of the EU Commission in the EU Commission Barroso II since November 27, 2009. In June 2014, Almunia rejected the Federal Ministry of Economics' proposed amendments to the EEG law, as they the EU competition law collides, he denounced the payment of the EEG surcharge for imported electricity from other EU member states , since European companies do not receive the income from the EEG surcharge, but are only reserved for German green electricity producers. The exemption of some companies from the levy is also incompatible with competition law, as this only applies to large consumers and small energy-intensive companies are deliberately disadvantaged.

Under Almunia as EU Commissioner for Competition, the Commission imposed a total of around € 8.4 billion in fines between 2010 and 2014, which flowed into the EU budget and thus contributed to relieving the national budget.

Web links

Commons : Joaquín Almunia  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Homepage Almunias on the website of the European Commission
• Information from Europa Digital