The Public Accounts Committee this evening agreed to ask the Auditor General to treat the VGH hospital contract investigation with urgency but conceded that such a decision was at the discretion of the National Audit Office.

Auditor General Charles Deguara made it clear to the committee members that he did not wish to disrupt the chronological order of investigations as this would amount to a disservice to Parliament.

The PAC was debating a request by UHM – Voice of the Workers and the Medical Association of Malta to be given access to the full contracts.

The government published three contracts related to the hospitals deal in October but the documents were heavily redacted. Health Minister Chris Fearne said only the commercially sensitive parts were being censored.

Last week he told The Malta Independent that most of what was not being published were bits concerning the agreement between VGH and Barts Medical School. “There are other parts which contain commercially sensitive information and as happens with every contract published or tabled, these are kept hidden.”

Recently the UHM and MAM asked the PAC to look into the redacted parts, insisting that they could sign agreements with the private company in light of the secrecy surrounding parts of the contracts.

The government, on the other hand, said the deal should be debated by the Parliamentary Health Committee which, unlike the PAC, is chaired by a government MP.

The Health Minister this morning formally invited the PAC to request an investigation by the Auditor General but the PN said this was nothing but another delaying tactic, as an NAO investigation would not be completed before the general election.

Government MP Charles Mangion said the government had full faith in the Auditor General was not trying to limit his remit. In fact, it had given the NAO broad terms of reference. “This will ensure that the contracts are evaluated while the commercially sensitive parts are not jeopardized. We are trying to find the common road here. The NAO can send for anyone as witness and can investigate however it wants.”

Tourism Minister Edward Zammit Lewis said the NAO was at arm’s length from the administration and can work in an impartial manner. He also suggested that the contracts are debated by a joint Public Accounts and Health Committee, with an alternating chairperson.

Nationalist MP Chris Said did not agree that the terms of reference given by the government to the NAO covered all points raised by the unions. They did not entirely cover the question of whether VGH had the financial power to sustain the service, which include the entire health system in Gozo.

“This is a serious matter … we are talking about health here. Maltese citizens have a choice (of healthcare facilities) at least, but Gozitans do not. We should give the NAO direction and request that this investigation is given precedence and that it is carried out in the shortest time possible. This should be done in view of the unions’ refusal to sign any agreement with VGH until after an NAO investigation,” Dr Said added.

PAC Chairman Tonio Fenech said that if it followed the chronological order, the NAO would take more than two years to complete the VGH investigation. “This committee cannot set the NAO’s agenda but we can ask for this investigation to be treated with urgency. If the NAO agrees then we will agree to wait for the outcome of that investigation before we take up the subject before this committee.”

Auditor General Charles Deguara said he felt that the NAO should deal with the investigations in the chronological order they were received. “If we do not do this we would not be offering a good public service and we would be short-sighted.”

PL MP Charles Mangion said the decision should be up to the Auditor General, adding that the PAC did not have the resources to determine whether there was value for money in the hospitals deal and to judge the operator’s performance. He also noted that Parliament would hold a debate on the issue before the Christmas recess.

Dr Zammit Lewis agreed that the parliamentary committee should not tell the Auditor General to give precedence to one investigation or another because we would be impinging on the NAO’s autonomy. “We will have a situation where Parliament will hold a debate, where the NAO, a constitutionally appointed body, will do its own investigation, and where a joint committee will then debate the result of that investigation.”

Tonio Fenech said that when PAC sends matter for investigation by NAO its does not hold a parallel investigation. There is agreement that this should go before the NAO, which has more resources to investigate. In any case the government can refuse to present the full contracts before the PAC, but it cannot do the same to the NAO.

“The committee accepts that it cannot tell the NAO which investigation to carry out first but makes the request in any case. Once that investigation is concluded a joint committee will discuss the issue further.”

In concluding remarks, the Auditor General clarified that the NAO could not go into the merits of worker conditions, as that was not and had never been within its remit. “We can only investigate according to our own terms of reference,” he said.