The public has a right to know what goes on in Labour local councils; they operate with public funds and therefore are subjected to public scrutiny.

I decided to write about what goes on in a typical Labour council such as that of Cospicua; the hatred, the pique, the intolerance and misbehaviour that takes place even between Labour councillors themselves is to say the least, unbelievable.

The MLP has one of the strongest majorities in this council, six out of seven councillors, yet because of certain attitudes, this majority is reduced to four. One of the Labour councillors hardly ever attends (he was absent 11 times out of the last 13 council meetings), and the rest of the Labour councillors continuously ignore another Labour lady councillor.

A typical Cospicua Labour council meeting goes something like this, and I quote from what they actually wrote: “Only four Labour councillors are present for this meeting. The minutes of the previous meeting are approved by three votes in favour and one abstention.” (The abstention is the Labour councillor, who is practically always ignored). Labour councillors do not even agree on the composition of the council’s minutes. During a particular meeting three different council meeting minutes were put to the vote. This is a very extraordinary procedure, but for Labour anything goes. All the minutes of these three council meetings were approved with three votes in favour and one abstention. I sincerely feel dumbfounded on how and why such things are allowed to occur in our local councils. As far as I know a council meeting cannot proceed before the previous meeting minutes are approved.

The Acting Executive Secretary sends a memo to the mayor about the attendance, or rather the absence of one of the Labour councillors, which according to the secretary infringes Article 18 of the Local Councils Act. The mayor here declares that this item will be discussed later in the meeting.

Reliable information obtained state that until that moment the idea was to report the particular Labour councillor to the minister and ask for his removal from the council. I suspect, and it became very obvious, that the mayor and his group were overruled by the MLP and the report to the minister was not made.

The secretary would have never dared put the matter on the agenda unless the mayor was informed about it beforehand. In any case, when the item of absenteeism came up, the mayor declared that one of the councillors was absent for 11 meetings out of the last 13 meetings in the last six months, which means that the particular councillor attended less than one third of the meetings held. However, the mayor continued, this absence was due to pressure of work of the councillor concerned and for this reason the council decided to recommend to the minister that the councillor’s seat not be declared vacant as required by law. One wonders whether the department knows what is going on here!

Another item up for discussion during this meeting was Memo 26/2007 “report about the councils efficiency by the department”. This report states that the Cospicua local council was one of the three Labour most inefficient local councils in Malta. The minister put a copy of this report on the table in Parliament some weeks ago. But no comments were recorded on this subject except that a copy of the report was to be passed to each councillor. This confirms Labour’s disregard of the locality and the residents’ requirements.

Another hot potato was about a clerk who was employed as an office support clerk and who should have been considered as a self-employed person but was getting all benefits the same as a full time employee, such as leave, sick leave and bonuses. This particular clerk has a parental connection with the mayor and therefore did not take part in the discussion. The acting secretary was instructed to put things right; it is not known whether or not the self-employed person will make any refunds to the council.

The above is only a sample of what goes on in Labour councils, how public finances are wasted and the complete ignorance of local councils rules and regulations. These are grave matters people must consider before choosing their local representatives.

The Paola local council forced to repent

After a number of years breaking the law by employing more staff than allowed by law, the Paola local council was at long last ordered by the Local Councils Department to put their house in order and abide by the local councils’ rules and regulations. According to a statement by the Paola mayor in another section of the press, this matter has now been solved. Overdue action but better late than never.

Mtarfa and San Gwann remain without an executive secretary

Mtarfa local council has been without an executive for nearly two years. This council has not held a meeting for a period of five months and the San Gwann local council has been without a secretary for nearly a year. The executive secretary is the most important person in any local council and is its financial and administration head, wherever there is an efficient executive secretary the council performs well, but for some Labour majorities the word efficiency belongs to foreign language.

Local councils were created to offer a better standard of living to residents, to provide efficient service and to remove bureaucracy. Without an executive secretary in office such things will not occur, and if they do, no one will take responsibility for them. When we talk about service, we mean, service to the public and not the party the local council represents in its locality, as is the general habit of Labour councils.

I feel it is my duty to continue bringing these grave abuses to light so that the people will know whom to choose as their representatives in their locality.

Pawlu Aquilina

PN Local Councillors Coordinator