The owners of the Paola Band Club building have instituted a Constitutional Court case against the Attorney General and the Socjeta Filarmonika Antoine De Paule claiming that an amendment to the law has breached their fundamental human rights. 

The case, originally initiated in 1997, was concluded earlier this year following an Appeal Court sentence which decided that the band club was guilty of carrying out structural alterations on the premises without the owners’ permission.

The band club was ordered to vacate the premises, which has been rented from the owners since 1945 by September 2018.

This judgment was viewed as a concerning precedent for a number of other band clubs also being asked to vacate the building they were renting from private owners.

The government had subsequently said it would intervene to make sure the band club was not evicted. It also promised to address the situation.

But just before the eviction was enforced, the government passed a law which states that band clubs can only be evicted if there is non-payment of rent.

This meant that with this new law the De Paule Band Club would no longer be evicted from their premises.

Paul Cachia, the lawyer representing the owners of the property, argues that the right the owners had to take possession of their property, as was originally provided by the Courts, has now been made null.

The law was passed retrospectively to overturn the De Paule Band Club court case, Cachia argued in an application filed this week.

Discrimination is being claimed since there are no similar cases in which a right is acquired from the court and then a law is passed later to cancel that right.

This law also targets band clubs specifically. Therefore, if for example, a football club made structural changes without notifying the owner they would be evicted, while the band clubs would not.

The only case this law would alter is the one regarding the De Paule Band Club, so the lawyers are arguing this was simply a ‘knee-jerk’ reaction to the fact that this band club was going to be evicted.

The lawyers contend it is obvious that this law was passed to save this particular band club from eviction. If another similar case ensues whereby a band club makes structural alterations without notifying the owner, they will not be evicted but asked to pay a higher rent.

Cachia is also claiming infringement of the right to a fair hearing, the right to property, and the right to effective remedy which all form part of the European Convention of Human Rights.

The principle of legal certainty, which is a fundamental requirement of the rule of law, is part of the individual’s right to a fair trial. One of the requisites for the fulfilment of legal certainty is the finality of a court decision which in this case was nullified.

The court ruled that the property had to be given back to the owners. Now the remedy is not that of eviction but of a higher rent which Cachia claims is not an effective remedy.

Overturning a court’s ruling by passing a retrospective law is not the norm, the lawyers noted.

No reply to the application has been received from the Attorney General but according to the law, he has 20 days to reply from the time of filing the application.

When the amendments were applied through a Legal Notice, the Justice Ministry said the changes were meticulously planned and respected the rights of all concerned parties. Minister Owen Bonnici said there would be a balance between the rights of the tenants and the property owners.

Band clubs that are more than three generations old will be given protection if they lost their title, subject to a reasonable increase in the rent payment.

Property owners will also have the right to contest the conditions of the lease before the Rent Regulation Board. The board is being given the right to remedy any situations of ‘manifest disproportionality’ after taking into consideration the cultural and social functions of the band club.