This is a reformist Government. Ever since the Labour administration was elected to lead this country, it embarked on a journey of implementing a series of institutional and social reforms which had indeed been shelved for whole generations by previous PN administrations.

This Government had the courage to grab the bull by its horns and deliver much needed changes in our legal system which were long overdue, not least in the method of appointment of the judiciary - a system which had become stale and in dire need of reform.

Under subsequent Nationalist administrations, we had a system which enabled Prime Minister after Prime Minister to handpick members of the judiciary with unfettered discretion and without any form of checks and balances at all.

It was a Labour government that had the courage to bring about a much needed reform in the appointments of the judiciary - a reform which would scrap the principle of having the Prime Minister enjoying the sole prerogative to appoint members of the judiciary.

Back in 2016, I had the privilege to prepare and successfully push forward, as Justice Minister, an important reform which provided for the creation of a Judicial Appointments Committee which was tasked to, amongst other responsibilities, examine and evaluate candidates for the office of Judge of the Superior Courts or of Magistrate of the Inferior Courts and then provide advice to the Prime Minister on such appointments.

The members of the Judicial Appointments Committee all enjoyed institutional autonomy and security of tenure, except for the President of the Chamber of Advocates which, although not enjoying security of tenure akin to that of members of the judiciary, undoubtedly enjoyed total and absolute institutional autonomy from the Government.

By virtue of this historical reform, which I must emphasize and stress that it was unanimously approved by Parliament, the Prime Minister divested himself from the exclusive right to appoint members of the Judiciary and instead had to first seek the advice of the independent Commission tasked with evaluating candidates.

If the Prime Minister, for some reason or other, decided not follow this advice, he had to go to Parliament and provide justifications for such a decision.

Certainly, this reform was a breath of fresh air which did away once and for all with the unfettered discretion exercised by Prime Ministers under previous PN administrations and therefore introduced a more transparent mechanism as regards the appointment of the judiciary.

Notwithstanding the fact that this bold reform had indeed garnered the unanimous approval of the House of Representatives and despite the appreciation and satisfaction shown by the then shadow minister for Justice Jason Azzopardi who had described this reform as historical from the Constitutional point of view, a few months later civil society Repubblika along with senior members of the PN Parliamentary group, who had ironically and hypocritically voted in favour of such a reform in Parliament, decided to challenge the said reform in court.

Indeed, Repubblika had requested the court to issue a prohibitory injunction in order to stop the six new members of the judiciary who had undertaken the novel process of selection from taking the oath of office.

Such a request, which was signed by Jason Azzopardi, Simon Busutil and Therese Commodini Cachia, was rejected by the court as it was rightly ruled that, unlike what Repubblika claimed, "no irrevocable prejudice" would be created by the appointments.

Faced by such an outright rejection, Repubblika, aided by senior members from the PN parliamentary group, pursued the matter further before our domestic courts and later on even demanded that their case be referred to European Court of Justice. The aim was clear- to seek a pronouncement in the sense that the appointment of the new members of the judiciary was null and void and subsequently any judgment delivered by them in the meantime was null and void as well.

Indeed, matters were eventually brought before the European Court of Justice which was tasked with determining whether the new system of judicial appointments, as approved unanimously by Parliament in 2016, was in breach of the European Treaty and/or Charter of Fundamental Rights.

Such a referral to the European Court of Justice was described by Saint Jason Azzopardi as “Judicial history in the making” whilst further stating in a Facebook post that “The more spokes in the wheel Government puts in our quest to win this, the more determined we become.”

Probably, at the time of writing, he had forgotten that he had voted in favour of the same reform he was challenging before the European Court of Justice and had even more described it as constitutionally historic!

Nonetheless, Saint Jason’s euphoria was short-lived as on the 20th April, 2021, the European Court of Justice ruled against the claims brought forward by Repubblika and stated in clear and unequivocal terms that the method of appointment of members of the judiciary used by Malta back in 2019 did not breach EU law.

The court further stated that this reform actually improved the rule of law and the judicial system. This pronouncement is nothing less than a confirmation that a Labour administration, in reforming the mechanism of appointing members of the judiciary that had been stalled and shelved for more than 25 years by previous PN administrations, had acted in full respect of the principles of rule of law.

Needless to be said, the present Prime Minister, Dr Robert Abela, built further on the very good reform which was undertaken in 2016 and kept reforming the method of appointments of the members of the judiciary.

The Nationalist Party may attempt to hinder the progress and momentum that this Labour government has achieved, but they can never stop us from being a catalyst of change, from delivering much needed reforms and from taking bold and courageous decisions which others had shied away from taking.

The EU Court’s clean bill of health strengthens our determination to keep working for a better Malta!