It is a political appointment made by the Monarch with the advice of the minister in charge of the ministerial department.

The Secretary of State for Equality is responsible for proposing and developing the Government's policies on equality, prevention and elimination of all kinds of discrimination against persons based on sex, racial or ethnic origin, religion or ideology, sexual orientation or identity of gender, age, disability or any other condition or personal or social circumstance, and of eradication of the different forms of violence against women, as well as violence against lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex persons (LGBTI) and within the affective relationships of these.

[2] From Secretariat of State depend two departments, the Directorate-General for Equality of Treatment and Diversity and the Government Delegation for Gender Violence.

At the very first, the equality department was within the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs with the level of a General Secretariat between 2004 and 2008.

In 2018, with the arrival of PM Pedro Sánchez the Secretariat of State recovered its full autonomy and importance when it was integrated in the Ministry of the Presidency, with the direct supervision of the Deputy Prime Minister.