The publicly-funded WasteServ seems to have learned nothing from the report of the Auditor General, who is understood to be still investigating in depth the company’s operations in all its aspects, Labour MP Leo Brincat, party spokesman for the environment, said.
But WasteServ in a statement denied that there was disagreement on the report it presented to the regulator. As is done regularly, audit inspections are carried out between Mepa and WasteServ on how and when such figures are presented for the simple reason for Malta to be on the same wavelength as other countries.
Mr Brincat said they were getting reports about serious disagreement between the regulator, Mepa, and Wasteserv about data the latter supplies to the regulator at intervals, and they were not excluding the possibility that ministerial pressure may have been applied for certain discrepancies to be minimised.
On the other hand Mepa’s webpage, including all the permitted waste facilities in Malta and Gozo, has no information on it and it is being said that WasteServ had recently closed its eyes to the export of hazardous waste to India, listed as Green listed non-hazardous waste, including white goods with many hazardous components.
Mr Brincat said WasteServ may possibly be aware of all this but is allowing it to reduce its operational costs, seeing that the export of hazardous waste costs more. He added that they had been calling for a serious technical and independent investigation into the operations of the company since 2010.
In its statement, WasteServ said that the company’s efforts to treat electronic waste were continuous. In 2012, 750 tonnes of electronic waste were treated and exported, and another 94 tonnes were exported this year. This was done through brokers that had Mepa’s permission to treat and export such material. Mepa regularly carries out inspections in this regard.
In reference to the auditor general’s report, WasteServ said that it had always provided all information required and it was not true that it had not taken action on his recommendations. WasteServ had implemented several measures to improve its operations. The company said the Opposition’s statement was another case of the Labour Party trying to belittle the successes that have been achieved.