Good morning. My name is Pablo Garcia-Manzano. Firstly, I want to thank you all for giving me the opportunity to work in Ashurst and also for this promotion to partner. It’s truly very important to me, as well as very exciting to be here.
I’ll start with a brief presentation of my professional career. I must begin by saying that from a very young age, I was immersed in the law as my father was a Spanish Supreme Court and a Constitutional Court judge. I have witnessed and heard talk of legal cases practically throughout my entire life.
I studied a degree in Law at the Complutense University of Madrid (a voluntary decision, in spite of everything), which at that time was the most prestigious University in Spain.
Part 2
I had two excellent professors of Administrative Law; one of them was a magistrate of the Constitutional Court and now a lawyer of the Council of State. I graduated from my degree with honors. I took a series of State Exams that afforded me the opportunity to enter the body of State Council lawyers. A quite select group seeing as it consisted of only about 40 lawyers in all of Spain. The reputation held by this group was excellent both in the Judicial world as well as in Spanish public life. Some of the councilors were leaders of the Spanish political transition in the 80s. The State Council will celebrate it’s 500 year anniversary in 2022, coinciding with the 200 year anniversary of Ashurst.
Part 3
After passing the State Exams, I began working in the State Council where I spent the following 15 years, 14 of them in a Section that deals with the affairs of Economy and Finance. It is probably the section with the highest workload in the Council, as it informs and reviews all the bills related to economic and tax matters, many of which supersede European Union Law. During this stage I also did my Doctorate degree in Banking Regulations of the Bank of Spain and the independent regulatory commissions at the Complutense University and was granted the “cum laude”.
Part 4
The Council is the supreme advisory body of the Government and its members include the former Presidents and 8 Permanent Councilors who have a lifelong character similar to the nine old men of the Supreme Court of the USA. There is an outstanding level of legal knowledge within this Council.
However, the job was also somewhat theoretical and far from political and business life. The second and last part of this journey came with the decision to make my job compatible with an academic / executive activity in a business school, IESE Business School; and then also accept the invitation of the Minister of Energy, Tourism and Digital Agenda to become Deputy Secretary (a sort of number 3 within the Ministry) to participate in Government.
Part 5
The time spent in IESE was very beneficial for me in terms of mastering the tasks of team management and general management (I was the Executive Director of a relatively small center of Government and Public Leadership). It was also very useful in making contact with the American University (a school originally founded in the 1950´s and- in the sector I took part in- very similar to Harvard Kennedy School of Government, where I made two brief informal visits in 2012 and 2014).Regarding the time spent in Government, although brief, it permitted me to excel enormously in a transformative capacity. Let me tell you in some detail (albeit briefly) how the Government’s labor in Spain essentially works. The Council of Ministers meet every Friday to approve the most relevant laws, or bills, regulations and agreements. The task of preparing these rules and agreements is carried out by a Commission of about 30 members that are separated into second level, Secretaries of State, and third level, the Sub-Secretaries or "Deputy Secretary" of all Ministries.
Part 6
During the year and a half that I spent in this Council, I was mainly negotiating with actors from the private sector and the other ministries, as well as reviewing and finalizing projects the government was approving in that current moment.In addition, the Deputy Secretary was responsible for multiple relevant functions within the Ministry. In my case, I had to coordinate the three different economic areas or sectors – all highly diverse between them – that made up the Ministry: Energy, Telecommunications, and Digital Agenda.According to Spanish law, the role of Deputy Secretary implies being the Chief of Staff of the entire Ministry (overseeing about 1500 people), the Director of the Department’s budget which is submitted to the Cortes (worth about €5.5 million), and also implies being head of legal services (a very complex situation, especially in the Energy field).
Part 7
Perhaps you’re asking yourself, why do I now want to become part of Ashurst?
Firstly, I believe it would allow me to naturally develop my abilities and professional skills, both legal and in team management and teamwork. The global character of Ashurst is something that especially interests me. It exists in 25 countries and has been a prestigious firm for literally hundreds of years. Ashurst is an organization that due to it’s style and size is one that I take great pride in belonging to.
Taking into account that Spain and Spanish law are only a small part of the enormous legal world and contribute in a small amount to the consistent evolution of the practice of the legal profession, an evolution that’s persistently accelerating in a faster and more intense manner every day.
Part 8 & 9
My desire to play in the “league” of the real world, of one of the best law firms in the world and to solve problems concerning large companies and clients (which I have only had experience with as a regulator but not from the other side yet), is for me, perhaps one of the main reasons why I want to take this next step.
After the “legal tsunami” which was somewhat incorporated into the Spanish Government for nearly two years and due to the rhythm and volume of problems that I’ve witnessed during my career, I want to continue being a main player in the world of Economy and Law. I think Ashurst plays a very important role here.
Finally, I also believe that, at my current age and at this point of my personal and professional development (I now have five daughters, some of whom are still very small), and due to what I would define as my “vocation for law and high-level counseling”, Ashurst is definitely my place.
Part 10
To sum up, and excuse me if I’ve gone on for too long, I would like to say only a few words about how I feel I can contribute to this company and what I can achieve as partner in this firm.
First of all, I believe that knowledge is obviously an important element. I feel incredibly familiar with Spanish public law, not only from a theoretical perspective or from official reports or opinions, but also - and due in large part to my previous experience in the Ministry of Energy and regulated sectors - with real and concrete public law, something that is of great interest to big corporations.
Part 11
As is well known, in Spain and continental Europe, the majority of public law is developed in a more general part; contracts, liability for damages, general regulation of networks and concessions in some relevant sectors such as infrastructure, energy, telecommunications or financial services, etc. Through out my professional career I have had experience with practically all these different matters of law in one way or another. Although, these past two years I have been more closely involved in matters concerning energy in Europe and Spain, as well as the regulation of telecommunications, audiovisual sector, etc.
Part 12
I have also had to intervene from the legal point of view of the regulator in some important operations. For example, seeing as it has already been closed and is of public record, the Atlantica OPA on Abertis requir