Those who were either present for, or listened to the parliamentary questions on Tuesday night, undoubtedly must have asked themselves whether what they were hearing was really being said or not.
A PQ tabled by one of our MPs asked each minister to provide details of all travel abroad made so far during this legislature. The replies given by each minister were the same or similar, showing that the reply was an orchestrated one. They made reference to answers given to PQs asked in Legislature 9, that is, some 14 years ago.
No Opposition party worthy of its name takes this lying done. So we surely did not do so. A number of us asked supplementary questions. Such a question was asked to the Minister of Gozo. He was asked why he did not want to answer the question. Was there anything he wanted to hide? He failed to answer and looked perturbed all the way. At one point, fellow minister Evarist Bartolo stood up and said that he disagreed with Minister Refalo and he found no problem in giving out the required information. In fact, he gave out, verbally, the number of official trips abroad he went on during this period. At that point he was challenged by us. So, why are you providing the same written reply like all the others? Without blinking his eyes, he indicated that he had not seen the reply given to the parliamentary question, almost blaming his officers for going along with it.
My gosh! So the most expensive Cabinet of Ministers is failing in the most basic of its parliament-related function, that of answering each parliamentary question and knowing what he or she is answering. Obviously, their leader, the prime minister, did not take responsibility for the orchestrated reply, which, by the way, was loaded with Dr Muscat's sense of British humour he is so famous for (sic). In fact, it had Joseph Muscat written all over it. But of course he had nothing to do with it. What a cheek. It is a pity all this was not broadcast live on TV, thanks to this government's sheer incompetence which failed to meet the self-imposed deadline of opening the new Parliament with all its new facilities.
A historical statement
On the last day of October, six former presidents of eNGO Din l-Art Ħelwa published an open letter to the Prime Minister on the state of the environment in Malta at this moment in time. They made a point of stating that in all the 50 years of Din l-Art Ħelwa's existence, it was the first time that they felt the need to express their deep concern about the current state of the environment and the government's plans for the future. Their main concern is this government's failure to review the national Structure Plan opting instead to reissue a set of objectives, known as SPED (Strategic Plan for Environment and Development), which were drawn up more than two years ago in preparation for the actual review of the Plan.
The crux of the matter is this government's clear intention of side-lining Parliament, which should approve such a Strategic Plan, and making this role solely the Minister's. This is nothing but a throwback to the times when socialist ministers used to take all decisions related to planning with the obvious disastrous results. It was only thanks to a new PN administration in 1987 that planning decisions was taken from the politicians' hands and given to the experts in the field who were guided by a detailed and comprehensive structure plan approved by Parliament. Mepa and its predecessors have/had many defects. I would say it has contributed to the PN's defeat in the last election. Not all the decisions it had taken were good, but I cannot imagine what this blessed Island would have looked like today if it weren't for the many decisions that had to be taken that were largely based on planning issues rather than on political convenience.
I am sure the eNGOs that have the environment so much at heart and those who wrote this open letter fear the worst under this government. As far as I know, no government minister has reacted to what has been written and said. As usual, the government who is 'ready to listen' has largely brushed off this criticism which has even led to a national protest. They even had the cheek to admit that they had 'forgotten' the environment when drafting the pre-budget document. I would say they have forgotten and ignored the environment in many of decisions they have taken so far. We will keep watching them, and we commit ourselves to stepping up our action to do whatever is necessary to stop this government from wiping out what little unspoilt land we have left to score political points with the few.
Charlò Bonnici is Shadow Minister for Sustainable Development, the Environment and Climate Change.