The current debate at committee stage by the Committee for the Considerations of Bills of the divorce Bill continues to show up the dangers when legislating outside the normal parameters of law, drafting and piloting a bill through the House.

One of the novel features in this particular Bill’s drafting and correcting procedure is, as has also been noted elsewhere, the fact that it came from two MPs, one a backbencher on the government side and the other a frontbencher from the Opposition together with outside help, notably from Dr Deborah Schembri.

Normally Bills are prepared by the Attorney General’s Office and are piloted by the relevant minister. The AG office would have done its homework and the minister would have taken all the relevant policy decisions so he/she are able to really pilot the Bill.

This time, neither Dr Pullicino Orlando nor Evarist Bartolo have legislative experience. One doubts if they ever had to sit in the parliamentary committee for the drafting of Bills. Neither of them is a lawyer.

Nevertheless, a huge feat considering the above, the two have succeeded in driving ahead the divorce issue, first past the prime minister’s initial reaction and that of the PN parliamentary group, then through a divisive referendum and now through the House.

It must also be emphasised the admiration with which the country has assisted at the selfless and unstinting collaboration offered to the nominated members of this parliamentary committee by so many Members, ministers even. The two sides had set up internal committees to deal with the Bill, piloted on each side by Francis Zammit Dimech and Owen Bonnici, both lawyers, which helped provide a legislative framework to the discussion.

Given the above, the JPO-Bartolo Bill proves to be a work in progress at most times, a departure from the usual cut-and-dried Bill presented by the AG where any hiccups have been previously ironed out.

Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando, both on Monday and yesterday, was clear that he realised that a rather crucial issue had been inadvertently left out: Who will be given child custody if a mother dies and the father has been found guilty of abuse on their children?

There was almost unanimous agreement in the committee that child custody in such cases must not be automatically shifted from the mother to the father.

Jean-Pierre Farrugia made a series of speeches both last week and on Monday to insist on a change as regarding mental and physical disabilities. One got the clear perception that Dr Farrugia’s repeated insistence upset the rest of the Members present especially when it was found out that his definition of mental disability is outside the law as it reads at present.

Not without justification, Dr Farrugia pleaded his insistence that just as the committee felt it could break new ground in the educational sphere, so too he felt it could break new ground with regards to health. This was not accepted by the committee (while someone pointed out that Dr Farrugia had abstained on the second reading).

The progress with regards to the educational sector regards extending the maintenance period for children from the present 18 to 23 or 24 years to provide children from broken families with access to tertiary education.

The divorce Bill cuts through a number of social issues, some of which have already been touched by the debate. An example of this was the insistence, from all sides, that divorce must not be allowed to become the rich people’s plaything while placing insurmountable obstacles in the path of the poor.

And it would seem that the wording of the Bill puts paid to the dire warning, given by Dr Gonzi today week, that no Bill can ‘guarantee’ maintenance payments. The law does what the law can do; it cannot do what it is not in its nature to do. It acts within the realms of the possible.

All in all, this part of the legislative process has been a really democratic experience and it also showed how the two sides do not spend their time in the House just throwing brickbats at each other, but also come together to draft laws in the national interest. The availability of committee meetings being streamed on the Internet may have led to many people listening in from their (air-conditioned) homes. In other times, the committee meetings would have attracted crowds to a deserted House of Representatives. That would have been a real democratic experience.