From Mr J. P. Borg

It’s common knowledge that no problem can be solved if its cause is not sought and rectified. This applies to the present parking problem. Half-baked solutions like the provision of discriminatory residents parking schemes highlights the egoistic nature of those who favour these schemes introduced by local councils. I have taken the Pieta council to court for carrying out this scheme and the court upheld my plea on the basis of discrimination between citizens from different localities who pay their road tax contribution to the same authority.

It is often rightly stated that some councils abroad prohibit street parking for visitors from other cities or towns. This is acceptable because it is not discriminatory, since visitors pay their road tax to the authority of their locality and should not expect to share the advantages of street parking to the detriment of the locals of a place where they do not contribute to street usage.

A century ago no parking problems existed for car owners even though the streets were fewer and narrower. Horse drawn cabbies were the order of the day. But no owner ever thought of leaving his horse and cab in the street when not in use, and the streets were left free to be used by others.

The advent of the car, initially, followed the same course. The general understanding was that streets enable us to travel to reach our pre-determined destination, and on our return the car is garaged.

In no time, these civil manners were overtaken by selfish instincts. Nowadays people do not care to but or rent a garage before they buy their car. They presume that they have a right to leave the car in the street in front of their residence when not using it. They even have the barefaced expectation that the car space in front of their residence should be left unoccupied, even when needed by others, so as to be reserved for them on their return. Unbelievably, some local councils sanction such an arrogant and egoistic mentality, even though our court has declared such action to be illegal.

Car owners who do not make use of a garage, and leave their car on the streets, are the main cause of our parking problems. Based on the generally accepted principle of “polluter pays”, these car owners should be penalised and made to pay a sum of say €300 a year to be used by government for the construction of car parks.

However, due to the fact that Malta has one of the highest population densities in the world, which in turn is reflected in the high rate of cars per road area, the car road licence should be substantially increased in order to hinder the uncontrollable number of new cars on our roads, while the purchase tax on new cars should be abolished and old jalopies taken off the roads, for the sake of a better environment.

Joseph P. Borg

SWIEQI