The Building & Construction Authority’s first CEO Karl Azzopardi resigned from his post by Planning Minister Stefan Zrinzo Azzopardi soon after the last general election due to a disagreement over the plan for the way forward for the authority.

This emerged from Azzopardi’s own testimony during the third session of the public inquiry appointed to look into the death of Jean Paul Sofia, who died following a building collapse in Kordin on Friday. 

Azzopardi, when questioned by public inquiry chair and retired judge Joseph Zammit McKeon, said that following the last general election, which took place in March 2022, a meeting was held with Minister Zrinzo Azzopardi and the two reached an “agreement to disagree” – which he took as a sign that his time at the authority was up. 

“I felt from the language used that if I stayed there…  I couldn’t stay there… the minister appoints you, the minister can remove you,” Azzopardi said.

“He did not agree with my leadership of the BCA,” Azzopardi said of the minister.

However, Zammit McKeon pointed out that Azzopardi’s contract was for three years, so the minister cannot simply “remove” him.

Azzopardi confirmed, in fact, that his departure from the authority was imposed as a “constructive dismissal” and that he has opened a case before the industrial tribunal on his sacking.  The case is still pending a decision.

Azzopardi continued that in this meeting he wanted to continue to engage more people and open more consultations, rather than to “stop and wait”, but he “felt” that there was a divergence in direction and that what had been his vision for the authority was no longer the favoured one.

Asked about his plans for the BCA when he was appointed as CEO, Azzopardi said that he wanted to increase the human resources department to have no less than 300 people.

Answering questions by Zammit McKeon on what budgets he had requested to this end, Azzopardi said that the first request was for €18 million, but the authority ultimately got €9 million.  This was supported by a business plan which outlined how the authority would develop, even from a human resources perspective.

However, he said that due the general election, recruitment slowed down.  Nonetheless, the BCA had gone from around 45 staff members in April 2021 when it opened its doors to around 70 by the time he had been dismissed.

Asked to give a figure as to how many out of the employees had been engaged as enforcement ground inspectors, Azzopardi said he could not recall a specific number but “between around 9 and 11 people.”

Azzopardi was asked about the BCA’s board of directors, which at the time was made up of 11 people and chaired by architect Maria Scembri Grima – who also testified on Friday.

Grima’s appointment as chairperson had stoked controversy particularly as she is the architect of choice for Gozitan mega-developer Joseph Portelli.

She resigned her post last February after a wall which was part of the project she was the architect of collapsed into a road in Birkirkara.

Detailing their competencies, Azzopardi said that some of these were architects and confirmed after being asked that he did not see any conflict of interest between architects who continued with their private practice whilst being part of the board.

Not only did he say that he did not see any conflict of interest, but he defended it as he believes that having architects on the ground adds strength as they get a better feel for the industry and how it is developing.

In total, during his employment with the authority the former CEO said that there were four reforms introduced.

The first being the National Building Code, the second is the licensing of contractors, the third is the mandatory skills card for workers, and the fourth is the Energy Performance Certificate.

He said that following the reforms, then the BCA started to focus on the education system to start offering courses which can lead to the licenses and to promote skills ‘which have been lost’.

Detailing his work during the first few months at the BCA, Azzopardi said that the authority “rolled up its sleeves” created working groups first and foremost to understand the industry and to take a snapshot.

Azzopardi said that there were a number of technical meetings and workshops with the Planning Authority, where it was specified that the BCA’s work can be combined with that of the PA.

Zammit McKeon challenged and said that if he were to be CEO of such a new authority, the first thing he would do is to seek order: “Before we are seeing the standards we want, give us some time to get on our feet… did something happen to this end?  And if there was, did you get feedback from the PA?”

In reply Azzopardi said that these discussions happened and there was a preliminary agreement for the BCA to have an input at planning stage of an application. He explained that problems in the sector are very vast many of which weren’t done “in 30 or 40 years”. He said that the way in which the BCA was tackling the issues was through a staggered approach to “to address without shocking the system”

There were some reforms however which remained on the shelf: three separate building codes which could standardise a lot of practices within the industry were completed, but have remained untouched and un-implemented, Azzopardi told the board.

Lawyer Therese Comodini Cachia, who is representing the Sofia family, asked on plans for the licensing of contractors, and on whether that included that a contractor is personally liable for anything which may go wrong. Azzopardi replied in the positive.

He said that by 2022, the board had drafts in hand of the proposed legislation for the licensing of contractors, feedback on it was received and work began on that feedback.

However, he highlighted how his proposals “were different” to the ones ultimately published recently, as they were more holistic “not just a structural approach to construction and demolition.”

In giving a more detailed explanation of his proposals, he said that they were designed according to the needs of the site such that every person involved “even those managing traffic near the site” had to be trained.

On a question directly related to the case of Jean Paul Sofia, Azzopardi said that since there were no third-party issues, then it does not fall within the remit of the authority. However, he added that as a regulator of the standards of construction it should be responsible enough to look into the case to know what happened.

During Friday’s sitting, Azzopardi’s successor and current BCA CEO Jesmond Muscat also testified.

Muscat confirmed that at the time he heard about the collapse of the building he was at home, but that he made his way to the site.

Asked what he saw, he said “the disaster that there was.”

Muscat was asked by Zammit McKeon why he felt the need to be there, given that as previously highlighted during Azzopardi’s testimony, the building’s collapse did not fall within the remits of the BCA. To this, Muscat said that given the authority was just informed of a collapse without any PA number or any other identification he felt responsible to be there.

He said that the BCA discussed the collapse in a board meeting on the 15 December 2022, and resolved that it had nothing to do with it. He also said during the first week of August the board had also discussed the public inquiry in a meeting.

Muscat described the construction sector as something which is on its “death bed” and said that the BCA is trying to resuscitate it.

Zammit McKeon asked whether the situation was beyond control to which Muscat replied that “there is still a chance to fix it. Giving figures to the board on the authority’s enforcement work, he said that the BCA had carried a total of 6,200 inspections in 2021, which rose to over 10,200 in 2022, and over 7,000 inspections have been done so far this year.

During his round of questioning Auditor General Charles Deguara asked for the BCA’s audited accounts and for details about its Budget estimate requests.

Muscat said that for the next Budget, the BCA has requested €3 million in capital expenditure and €10.74 million in operating expenditure. He added that such expenditure will cover amongst others, the enforcement team, which is set to increase by six people: four inspectors and two more seniors. 

However, Deguara questioned the effectiveness of such a small number of inspectors to be engaged, whilst muscat defended his stand and said that “you can never have enough people to enforce the rules. “ 

On his part Cassar touched upon the insurance coverage for contractors. He highlighted the fact that such an insurance would make the workplace much safer.

Muscat agreed, however said that before insurance providers know approximately the number of contractors on the islands, they cannot have a holistic picture of “who they are dealing with”.

On the licensing of contractors, following a question by Comodini Cachia, it resulted that the licensing of contractors which came into effect this year, took around four years to complete, with the first draft of this reform being done by the old BRO back in 2019.