The Ombudsman has appealed to the Constitutional Court the reduction of the special protection of the wolf in Spain, which in practice allows the hunting of the canine in Spain, as reported by Europa Press sources from the institution, which filed the appeal on Tuesday, July 1.
In this way, they indicate that they have received 278 requests urging them to file a constitutional appeal against the eighth additional provision, the single transitory provision, and the nineteenth final provision of Law 1/2025, of April 1, on Prevention of Food Loss and Waste, through which the wolf was removed from the LESPRE, the List of Wild Species under Special Protection Regime.
Since then and until two weeks ago, in Cantabria, 16 of the planned extractions for this year had been carried out after recovering the management plan for the canine, to which five more deaths of specimens due to different causes (run-overs and illness) are added.
The mentioned provisions, which were presented by several parliamentary groups as amendments to Law 1/2025, are related to a possible deactivation of wolf protection.
According to the Ombudsman’s Office – which has informed the applicants of the filing of the appeal – the wolf is a protected species under Law 42/2007, of December 3, on Natural Heritage and Biodiversity, and is part, as a wild animal, of the List of Wild Species under Special Protection Regime (LESPRE).
After analyzing the requests received, the institution has decided to file a constitutional appeal because it believes that these three provisions would violate articles 45 – the right to the environment – and 24.1 of the Constitution – the right to effective judicial protection.
The Ombudsman has responded by letter to the associations that have requested the constitutional appeal – such as ASCEL, which filed it on April 7; or PACMA – to communicate their decision.
In the text, to which Europa Press has had access, the state agency states that the nineteenth final provision of the law, which removes the wolf north of the Duero from the LESPRE, «constitutes an example of a self-applying singular law, a law that does not constitute a normal exercise of legislative power, but an activity, material and typically executive, of applying the rule to the specific case, and that does not comply with the criteria set for laws of this nature in the jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court.»
Furthermore, it emphasizes that the eighth additional provision and the single transitory provision «do not comply with the mandate derived from article 45 of the Constitution to reconcile economic activity with environmental protection, weighing all constitutional values that are protectable.»
The first establishes that exceptional authorizations to hunt wolves – and any predatory species with a high impact on the productive system included in the LESPRE – can be justified by «the efficiency of the production system», in addition to the other reasons already provided for in the Law on Natural Heritage and Biodiversity. The second marks the immediate exit of the LESPRE from the wolf populations south of the Duero in case its protection regime at the community level is modified, something that has already happened.
Various Political and Judicial Battles Over Wolf Hunting
The provisions of the Food Waste Law that reduce wolf protection were included by the Senate as amendments to the bill and approved by the Congress in March with the votes of PP, Vox, PNV, and UPN (and Junts, in the case of provisions that opened the possibility of extending the removal of special protection of the species to the rest of Spain and not just north of the Duero).
Thus, the protection of the LESPRE was limited to wolf populations south of the Duero. Last month, the transitory provision of the Food Waste Law came into play, which also excluded these populations from the LESPRE once the European Union (EU) lowered the status of wolf protection in the Habitats Directive.
Since then, autonomous communities such as Asturias, Cantabria, and Galicia presented plans to hunt the species that environmental organizations like WWF and Ecologistas en Acción threatened to challenge. In fact, Ecologistas en Acción and the Platform for the Defense of the Cantabrian Mountain Range went to the Superior Court of Justice of Cantabria (TSJC) to request the suspension of the resolution authorizing the extraction of wolves in Cantabria, a request that the High Court ultimately rejected.
Transition to Ecology transmitted to the media last week the main data of the six-year report with the wolf census that must be sent to Brussels after its approval by the autonomous communities. This yielded a figure of 333 packs and between 1,600 to 1,700 wolves, a 12% growth compared to the previous census (2012-2014). According to the Ministry, the numbers do not reach the 500 that scientists consider necessary to ensure the genetic viability of the species in the long term.
In this context, sources from the Transition to Ecology emphasized that the wolf is in an unfavorable state in Spain and therefore «there cannot be lethal controls of the species», referring to the criterion of a judgment of the Court of Justice of the European Union (EU) of 2024, which states that if a species is in an unfavorable state in part of the territory, it is in the entire territory.
After a Sectorial Commission on the Environment that the PP criticized for its «harsh, disdainful tone, with lack of respect, clashes, and outbursts», the six-year report will finally be studied on July 11.
Reduction of Wolf Protection at the Proposal of Brussels
The Bern Convention, the international agreement governing the protection of fauna in Europe of which the European Union (EU) is part, voted in December in favor of changing the status of the wolf from ‘strictly protected’ to ‘protected’ at the proposal of Brussels. After the decision came into force in March, the European Commission proposed a specific review of the Habitats Directive to adapt the community rules to it.
The review, formalized in June, implies that the conservation and management measures of the Member States must achieve and maintain a favorable conservation status of the species. In addition, Member States will continue to have the possibility to maintain a higher level of wolf protection if national legislation deems it necessary.
Likewise, the EU will continue to finance and support coexistence and prevention measures, and in principle, state aid to compensate affected breeders will be maintained.
FUENTE
