Colau proposes paid leave for chosen family as Sánchez floats a friendship union in Spain

Frente Amplio's chosen-family proposal

On Sunday, 15 November, Frente Amplio proposed that the "chosen family", meaning close friends and neighbours, be able to take paid leave to provide care. The proposal was unveiled in a video posted on social media by the coalition's candidate, Ada Colau, shortly before a campaign rally in Zaragoza. In the clip she asked viewers how often they had felt that a friend was their family.

“How many times have you felt that your friend is your family?”

Colau argued that more people now rely on a friend or neighbour when they are ill, hospitalised or need help with children, especially women, migrants without family networks in Spain and LGBTI people. The coalition wants the Ley de Familias to include the principle of free designation of affective and care bonds, with greater employment protection. Paid leave currently exists only for family ties, in cases of illness, hospitalisation, death, dependency care, accompaniment and child-rearing. Frente Amplio says recognising these networks would be voluntary and would not automatically impose care duties.

In Zaragoza, Colau put the case in direct terms.

“It is high time we recognised the chosen family.”

The PSOE's friendship union

Pedro Sánchez presented a parallel idea in Alcorcón, in the Madrid region, describing it as one of five measures highlighted from the PSOE's programme for the 29-N election. The programme would create a new legal figure, the "unión de amistad", in the Civil Code to give legal cover to people linked by friendship or companionship who commit to caring for one another. Sánchez said the name reflects people the speakers care about and who choose to look after each other. The programme does not say which rights the union would carry, stating only that forming one would allow beneficiaries to unlock benefits. Unlike the Catalan model, the PSOE text does not require cohabitation.

Spain already has partial models. Catalonia's Civil Code regulates mutual-help cohabitation for adults who share a home, expenses or household tasks with intent to stay, and allows up to four people who are not related. Navarra's Fuero Nuevo recognises "comunidades de ayuda mutua", or mutual-aid communities.

Precedents in Germany and France

Germany also studied a similar figure. In 2024, then justice minister Marco Buschmann presented the basis for a Verantwortungsgemeinschaft, a "community of responsibility", that would let adults without kinship or marriage gain rights before a notary, such as asking a doctor for information. The model was capped at six people.

In France, La Francia Insumisa, the party of Jean-Luc Mélenchon, has a bill before the National Assembly that would give legal recognition to friendship and chosen family through a new figure resembling a civil union between two adults who are neither romantically involved nor related. Its measures include seven days of paid leave after the death of a close person without kinship, easier inheritance between friends, and a tax-advantaged designation of a friend as heir by will. The bill is still pending approval and also appears in Mélenchon's programme for the 2027 presidential election.

Campaign context

Colau used the Zaragoza rally to press Sánchez's voters, calling her list the "useful vote" needed for a progressive government. She said Sánchez was wrong to get drawn into insult exchanges with the right and far right instead of offering a stronger case. Colau also said the seat that Jorge Pueyo won in 2023 for Sumar, which Frente Amplio is now trying to retain, could prove decisive. Both the Frente Amplio and PSOE proposals are campaign pledges ahead of the 29-N vote, and neither has yet been tabled as a bill.