Secretary of State for Labour
senior post in the Spanish Administration
The secretary of state for labour, formerly known as secretary of state for employment or secretary-general for employment, is a senior minister of the Spanish Ministry of Labour responsible implementing the government policy on labour and its relations, working conditions, unemployment benefits and promotion of employment and self-employment. It is also responsible for managing the European Union funds of the European Social Fund Plus.
The current secretary of state is Joaquín Pérez Rey, a University of Castilla–La Mancha professor and head of the University's Labour and Social Security Law Department.
History
The position of Secretary of State for Labour was established in March 1981—named "of Employment and Labour Relations", when the ministries of Labour and of Health and Social Security were merged to form the Ministry of Labour, Health and Social Security. The secretary of state assumed all the powers of the defunct Ministry of Labour and acted as Under-Secretary of the new government department.
A few months later, in December 1981, the short-lived ministry was split in two and the Secretariat of State for Employment and Labour Relations was downgraded to Undersecretariat. The Under-Secretary for Social Security assumed the responsibilities of Under-Secretary of the Ministry until February 1982, when they were restored to the Under-Secretary for Employment.
In December 1982 the position was abolished and replaced by the Ministry's Under-Secretary until 1985, when responsibilities regarding labour policy and the ministry's internal management were separated, and the position was re-established as "Secretary-General for Employment and Labour Relations".
In 2010, during the premiership of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, the office was promoted again to Secretariat of State.
In 2020, the area of social economy was strengthened, with both the ministry and its state secretariat being named, and including this term in their name.
“Secretary of State for Labour” enters the record as senior post in the Spanish Administration. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Secretary, State and Labour can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 12, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q86453205. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1981, 1982, 1985 and 2010.
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This entry incorporates text from “Secretary of State for Labour” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.