A consortium which has submitted a bid for the tender to clean the new hospital yesterday filed its second application for a warrant of prohibitory injunction to halt the tendering process after a court yesterday turned down its first request.

The consortium Servizi Malta, which is composed of Bad Boy Cleaning Services Ltd, Euro Hygene International Ltd, MCCS Company Ltd and Coopservice S.Coop, last month filed an application for a warrant of prohibitory injunction to be issued to stop the adjudication process for cleaning services at the new hospital.

The First Hall of the Civil Court yesterday turned down Servizi Malta’s first application and soon after, the consortium filed its second application requesting the halting of the tender process.

The consortium had filed a judicial protest against the Director of Contracts last week, formally bringing to his notice the fact that two of the component companies in the only consortium now remaining eligible for consideration should, in their view, be disqualified as the objects clause in their Memorandum and Articles of Association did not include the power for the companies concerned to act in the sphere of delivery of cleaning services.

Citing this judicial protest in the application filed today, the consortium Servizi Malta informed the court that they expected that an organic and structural defect which made the provision of cleaning services ultra vires the powers of the companies that were being considered, would be treated in the same way as the minimal discrepancy in their own offer and bring about the disqualification of the only remaining consortium on the same basis.

If this disqualification were to happen after the technical and/or financial bid of the remaining consortium was opened, this would probably lead to even greater delay, as that consortium could plead that their bid was no longer confidential.

Dr Andrew Borg-Cardona signed the application for Servizi Malta.