St Paul’s Bay mayor Alfred Grima hopes that it is not too late to remedy overdevelopment issues that have hit his locality and other areas in Malta, saying that we are facing significant negative ripple effects unless corrective action is taken.

He admits however that he does not see a solution in sight. “Honestly, I don’t really know what can be done,” he said in an interview with The Malta Independent on Sunday.

St Paul’s Bay and the country as a whole have “a cardinal problem” when it comes to development, he said, calling for a more wholesome approach when it comes to planning, especially with regard to the height of buildings.

Grima said that St Paul’s Bay is among the localities with the highest number of ongoing planning applications in the country, questioning the sustainability of constructing additional storeys over existing infrastructure. This line of reasoning is also valid for other localities, he added.

Grima stated that he was of the opinion that certain areas featuring villas should remain as such, rather than see them being demolished to be replaced by blocks of apartments.

He called for more open spaces to be made available. In this regard, he lamented that some roads in St Paul’s Bay already do not have space to fit a single tree, let alone find ways to improve services offered to the residents.

As an example, the mayor referred to the waste collection issue, saying that current circumstances and present planning make it difficult to dream of installing underground bins for people to deposit their waste as an alternative solution to tackle waste collection issues that densely populated localities tend to face.

Moreover, he stated that while the new separation at source waste collection system undoubtedly worked successfully in many localities, it could not function well for larger towns with many blocks of apartments and, therefore, many more residents. He noted that there is a lack of enforcement and, unfortunately, many foreigners and Maltese alike do not follow the rules as they should. They are not disciplined and do not abide by the waste collection schedule properly.

He went as far as to describe how he used to send local council employees to separate mixed waste from recycling bins up to three times a day.

“The law imposes upon me that we must have 16 recycling sites – which I agree with. But before I am assured whose responsibility it is to ensure that these areas are used properly, and that I do not need to send anyone to perform such a degrading work of separating mixed waste, I shall hold myself accountable and not have them in the first place – even though I am in favour of recycling.”

Grima also expressed the local council’s helplessness towards tackling the waste collection issue as well as other problems the area often encounters.

Grima, who was elected on behalf of the Labour Party, told The Malta Independent on Sunday that he does not plan to contest the next elections in 2024 for two main reasons – his family and the local council’s lack of autonomy. After thanking his colleagues and supporters over the years, Grima said he intends to spend more quality time with his family.

Following this, the mayor pointed out that over the years, he always had the necessary tools in hand to help the local council govern over its area as it saw most fit – until recently. He indicated that “nowadays, the local council’s autonomy does not exist”; it is written in our legislation that “local councils are autonomous”, but this is no longer true at all.

Mayor Grima explained that with autonomous powers, the local council can decide what is best for the locality and proceed accordingly, but through power shifts over recent years, local councils now often need to seek approval from other entities, departments and authorities to get anything done. In short, he said that local councils now feel impotent because these powers have shifted, which has also led to more bureaucracy.

On a more specific level to St Paul’s Bay, Grima reiterated his opinion that the NSO population statistics for St Paul’s Bay must be inaccurate.

“The St Paul’s Bay local council receives funding for a population of 33,000 persons. Meanwhile, others, including myself, are sure that there are at least 45,000 permanent residents here.”

He continued that if these corrections are true, then St Paul’s Bay is receiving €900,000 less than it should in allocated funds.

Moreover, he noted that aside from less funding, this alleged incorrect population statistic is also resulting in the lessened and disproportionate allocation of all resources.

For one thing, Grima told The Malta Independent that there is never enough police presence. Through both numbers and pure observation, he said that it is easy to notice that the population totals within the area are rising at a swift pace. To illustrate his point, Grima talked about a school in Qawra which opened in 2020 with 575 students, describing how just three years later, this number has grown to 925 children. Backing up his train of thought, the mayor wondered how many of these children’s families were new residents.

According to the NSO St Paul’s Bay is the most populated locality in the country and also hosts the most residential non-Maltese.

Asked whether or not he believes the presence of so many foreigners in the locality hinders a sense of community, Grima said that he is concerned that we might lose touch of Maltese values. He elaborated: “I’m not saying that this is a good or bad thing. I’m saying that we should be careful that this country takes decisions that are needed for the country itself and for the good of Maltese culture before economic interests.”

The final subject discussed during this interview was that of crime in the area, following two recent serious incidents that took place in the locality, namely the street fight which occurred outside the Qawra church between two young Nigerian men and a story about a taxi driver who was robbed at knifepoint by a passenger he picked up from St Paul’s Bay. Both stories occurred in the first week of August.

After being questioned on the overall safety in St Paul’s Bay, Mayor Grima responded that it is natural to expect that such incidents occur when there is such a big population within a comparatively small area.

The mayor also described how, in the local council’s attempt to fight crime, it holds meetings with police approximately every three weeks – these meetings involve community police and sometimes even the assistant commissioner and the superintendent responsible for the St Paul’s Bay area.

“I don’t want these two incidents to push us away from all the good that local police do for us within the locality.”

Moreover, a definite improvement was observed in this regard over the last four years according to Grima, saying that while he did not have real statistics to back up his opinion, he felt that since the start of his ongoing term, progress has been made.