The Speaker of the House of Representatives has once again stepped in to defend the government that appointed him, this time to again deny a Member of the Opposition benches the facility to ask a parliamentary question.
MP Karol Aquilina wants to table two simple PQs: one asking the Prime Minister to table an uncensored version of the infamous Egrant inquiry, and the second a list of all the people who have had access to the inquiry.
The first question, after all that has come to pass since the publication of the inquiry’s conclusions months ago now, and if it were allowed to be asked, would no doubt be denied by the Prime Minister.
But we see no reason why the question cannot be asked, and why the Prime Minister should not be allowed to answer that question in the House.
As for the second question, this is very pertinent indeed considering the fact that while the Prime Minister, his justice minister and who knows how many other cohorts and aides have been able to rifle through its contents.
Those contents, whatever they are, are of the utmost national importance. According to much of the party in government, after all, the issue was the cause of the last general election.
While it is understandable that the Prime Minister, correctly or not, has chosen to take his sweet time to redact and publish the inquiry, it is abhorrent to think how many people have had access to this otherwise top secret file.
Opposition leader Adrian Delia has taken the issue to court and is demanding legal redress in the form of access, in his Constitutional role, to the inquiry.
That, according to the Prime Minister, should suffice. We do, however, need to ask, why the Opposition Leader has had to go to such lengths when the Prime Minister has signalled his willingness t6o have the report published in full.
It seems the Prime Minister says one thing, and does quite another thing altogether.
And in the meantime, Parliament has only been back in session for less than a week and the Speaker of the House is already back to his same old methods of gatekeeping for the government.
Over the last year, the Speaker had denied, on several occasions, the Opposition from asking questions.
The inquiry is certainly of public, and national, interest and it is nonsensical to prevent an MP from even asking these basic questions.
But in so doing the Speaker again referenced established procedure in the British House of Commons, just as he had done when blocking former opposition leader and MP Simon Busuttil's questions on the Prime Minister’s Chief of Staff Keith Schembri, insisting that PQs directed at Ministers should specifically relate to their responsibilities.
It would be interesting to see how the British House of Commons would react to something of the political magnitude of the Egrant inquiry if it had been handled in the way that the Muscat administration has handled it.
The Prime Minister, pressed hard by Delia in Parliament on the matter, also retreated to the Speaker’s line of defence.
Rest assured, all hell would break loose in that House, but in the Maltese House, it seems Parliament should focus on parliamentary business and that Delia’s case for access would be settled in the courts of law since the Opposition Leader had taken the issue there.
Very convenient indeed for the Prime Minister, who could resolve the whole matter with a couple clicks of a mouse, the same way the Attorney General had made the inquiry available to the justice minister and erstwhile legal consultant to the Prime Minister.
In the interest of democracy, the Speaker should, at the very least, allow the question to be asked and allow the Prime Minister to answer.
The Prime Minister is a big boy and we are certain he can answer for himself. For the Speaker to prevent the question from even asked in the first place is nothing but a glaring example of gatekeeping at its finest, or worst.