The main function of the Council is the management of Justice together with the protection or the guarantee of independence of Judges and Courts, when they perform their judicial function regarding to the rest of powers of the State and before all of them, even regarding to the other judicial bodies and those of the Judiciary per se.

The Council is in charge of tasks of an administrative/governmental nature and of internal procedure of the Judiciary. The internal government of the Courts correspond to the halls of the government of the High Court, the National High Court and the different High Courts of Justice, without prejudice of the functions that correspond to the Presidents of these Courts and to the holders of other jurisdictional bodies regarding to their own organic sphere. However, the Council performs the revising function of the proceedings carried out by these governmental bodies.

The obligations of the Council are extended to those questions affecting the government and the internal administration of the third power of the State: the appointment and promotion of Judges, together with administrative situations, licences, permits, prohibitions and incompatibilities; the inspection of Judges and Courts, and the judicial disciplinary system.

Added to these jurisdictions we can find, from one side, that referring to the selection and training of judges, taken on in 1994, and, from another side, the improvement of the quality of Justice regarding to the assumed fundamental right to an effective judicial guardianship.  

The functions and jurisdictions of the Council are divided in nine main areas:

• Regulated and discretionary appointments
• Court Inspection
• Judicial disciplinary system
• Judicial training
• Statutory authority
• Publication of sentences
• Advisory function
• Improvement of the quality of Justice
• International relations

As a constitutional body of self-government, the Council is legitimate to propose conflicts before the Constitutional Court for the defense of its jurisdiction.