Last week I was present, as part of the Maltese delegation, and as a voting member in the Council of Europe, which discussed the abortion document as presented by the committee of equal opportunities for women and men.
The rapporteur was hell bent on presenting a paper that wishes to legalise abortion, and although some minor amendments were adopted to sugar the whole paper, the final document goes against our principles. We did vote against, and lobbied for a ‘no’ vote, however the end result was 102 in favour, 69 against and 14 abstentions.
The assembly has 318 voting members, so as you see in the figures, some 130 members did not turn up to vote. With such a large number of absentees the vote could have changed, as the most ardent supporters of this paper were present for the debate. It seemed that the lobby group of this faction was much more organised, present and forceful, than any other group.
Members voted on their own, and without party group interference, although some political groups seemed more supportive than others. It was an experience hearing the whole day debate, with four-minute interventions on the pro and cons of abortion. I have already been quoted as saying that we were asked to play God on such a subject – that of taking a life – when we are so small to decide on such a matter of nature. Small not in size of our country, but small in size when compared to our Creator, who we seemingly wanted to oppose on this subject.
However after voting on some 70 amendments, the paper went through. It is a non-binding voting, but will be quoted in the future and hopefully will not result in future complications.
A news item that caught my eye in recent weeks was the large number of applicants from the Sliema area for a subsidy on balconies. This amazing number of applicants shows that we really love our wooden balconies, and that their upkeep, which comes at a cost, is a useful exercise and embellishes the town. May I add that if we do decorate them with some pots and flowers, with colour, we could help upgrade our environment that little bit extra.
A further news item was that there could be some development planned on an already existing place on the foreshore at Sliema. We wait and see.
On 8 March, a secondary voting took place, apart from that to elect a new government. There was voting to elect local councils, which many shy away from unless, of course, you needed or need the local council for some reason. Voting patterns differ, and some subjects keep cropping up, such as that concerning hamlets, whose residents are sometimes given the impression that they are distant from the core, not cared for and whose laments are not heard.
The central government does give them funds, but does not control whether or not the funds are spent on those hamlets. On my districts there are the cases of Kappara, l-Ibrag and Madliena. It is high time something concrete is done about this. Do they qualify to become a council on their own, having more voters, at times, than other established councils in Malta and Gozo? Should one consider that a person residing in these hamlets, and not outside them, should have a seat allocated in the council in order to participate and audit that works due that hamlet are really carried out?
I do believe in making our councils a bit more forward looking, rather than a stagnant institution that is curtailed on its growth within its own territory.
The future beckons.
Robert Arrigo is a Nationalist MP