Born in San Valentín, Fene, on 6 May 1971, next to the mammoth shipyard of Astilleros y Talleres del Noroeste, she is a member of a family of renowned trade unionists in Galicia active in the anti-francoist militancy. She joined the Communist Party at an early age. Díaz obtained a licentiate degreein Law at the University of Santiago de Compostela, and after earning three post-graduate degrees, she started to work as paralegal for a law firm, later registering as lawyer and opening her own law firm, specialising in labor law. She entered institutional politics in 2003, when she became member of the Ferrol municipal council. In 2005, she was elected leader of Esquerda Unida, the Galician federation of United Left. She stood as candidate in the list of the Galician Left Alternative coalition between EU and Anova vis-à-vis the October 2012 Galician regional election, becoming a member of the 9th Parliament of Galicia in representation of A Coruña. She ran in the En Marea list for the 2015 general election becoming a member of the 11th term of the Lower House of the Spanish parliament. She has renovated her seat at the 2016, April 2019 and November 2019general elections, running respectively as candidate for the En Marea, En Común–Unidas Podemos and Galicia en Común alliances. She left the role of Coordinator General of EU in June 2017, being replaced by Eva Solla. Following the failure in the talks to reach a coalition government between the PSOE and Unidas Podemosin the Summer of 2019, Díaz—who positioned herself in favour of such prospect unlike other voices within IU, proposing just to invest Pedro Sánchez and reach a common programme for government—distanced herself from IU over discrepancies on how IU had handled the negotiations and eventually left the party in October 2019, while she remained a member of the PCE. Appointed as Minister of Labour and Social Economy of the Sánchez II Government, she was sworn in on 13 January 2020. Díaz, who put the struggle against precarious work as the main goal of her mandate, vowed then to repeal the 2012 labour market reform. She chose Joaquín Pérez Rey to hold to post the Secretary of State for Labour and Social Economy, effectively the number 2 in the Ministry. As Minister of Labour, she took part in the negotiation that achieved the increase in the minimum wage to 950 euros, as well as the derogation of the dismissal for medical leave. She also took part in the dispatch of labor inspections to the agricultural sector to monitor the working conditions of workers in the sector.
