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Code of Conducts and Ethics
15 principles on the road to excellence in business ethics
Basing relationships on respect, integrity and sustainability, promoting actions in line with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and providing top-quality services are targets closely linked to the 88 good conduct guidelines that Red Eléctrica Group and its employees support and follow through its new 'Code of Conduct and Ethics'.
“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.” Aristotle was inspired to write this without knowing that 25 centuries later, just as individuals have criteria for ethical behaviour, organisations that bring them together need a common consensus on conduct in order to help them pursue their goals with a forward-looking outlook and a constant eye on their voluntarily adopted ethical values.
Respect, integrity and sustainability are the three ethical values that form the basis of the new ‘Code of Conduct and Ethics’, approved by Red Eléctrica Group and including the 88 good practices grouped into 15 principles, in line with the Sustainable Development Goals and the company's sustainability and governance commitments.
This Code, which both employees and the whole organisation commit to comply with when carrying out their business, groups these principles into three types of fields according to the relationships that the company and its employees maintain in their day to day activities:
- The relationship with the environment, where guidelines are provided on good conduct to prevent corruption and money laundering, as well as transparency in managing interests, continuously improving the client experience, conserving and improving the environment, and contributing to community development, among others.
- The relationship with people, which is based on respecting people and rights at work, ensuring health, safety and wellbeing in the working environment and promoting and respecting diversity.
- The relationship with the organisation, which details good habits to adopt with regard to disclosing financial and nonfinancial information, managing conflicts of interest, the protection and responsible use of assets and protecting confidentiality and personal data.
The ‘Code of Conducts and Ethics’, which the entire workforce has participated in drafting, is mandatory for everyone in the Red Eléctrica Group and its global vision means that these ethical behaviour guidelines apply to the different processes that make up the supply chain.
Furthermore, the Compliance Policy adopted by the Red Eléctrica Group establishes the Group's commitment to the prevention, detection and response to conduct that contravenes the legal obligations and commitments voluntarily assumed by the company in accordance with the values, principles and guidelines contained in its Code of Ethics and Conduct.
What happens if any behaviour is found to be out of line with the values and principles contained in this Code? Red Eléctrica relies on the figure of the 'Ethics Manager and the stakeholders Ombudsman’, who handles any concerns that may arise and collects, analyses and resolves any complaints received. This figure, in direct contact with the Chair and the Board of Directors, will maintain the confidentiality of the processes and will be responsible for developing, consolidating and continuously improving ethics management at Red Eléctrica. There is a channel that anyone can use to make a query, suggestion or complaint which the ethics manager will answer in collaboration with the Compliance department.
Red Eléctrica promotes the spread of the values collected in this ‘Code of Conduct and Ethics’ among its stakeholders, since it also has a ‘Supplier Code of Conduct’ which is mandatory for suppliers and whose acceptance is a prerequisite for working with the Group’s companies.