Nationalist Party MP Claudette Buttigieg said that the new CEO of St Vincent de Paul elderly home, Jorgen Souness, had tried to make Buttigieg skip the queue for the Covid-19 vaccine in 2021.

Back then Souness was responsible for the vaccination programme during the pandemic. He was promoted to CEO of SVPR on 5 October.

During Wednesday’s plenary session, Buttigieg recounted an incident back in 2021, where she was accused in parliament of using her daughter's condition to skip the queue to take the Covid-19 vaccine. She had categorically denied these allegations, however, Health Minister Chris Fearne had said that she had approached him requesting this.

To shed light on the full story, on Wednesday, Buttigieg explained how on 27 February 2021 she had gone to a testing centre with her daughter, who was scheduled to take her vaccine jab that day.

Buttigieg recounted that a man had approached them and told them to follow him, which they did, skipping the queue. He asked whether they were part of the treatment abroad – which refers to patients with serious illnesses that are treated outside of Malta – but Buttigieg said that they were not and she refused to skip the queue.

“Today this man is being promoted as the acting CEO of SVPR,” Buttigieg said without stating the person’s name.

“He wanted to use me and pretend that I wanted to go for treatment abroad to skip the queue.”

Buttigieg added that although he “insisted” that she should skip the queue, she continued to refuse.

Buttigieg condemned the government for choosing to appoint people who have no intentions of improving the standards. She expressed her concern that the standards in this country are at this level,

“It is completely disgusting that we are dropping down to these levels,” she said.

She said that she was not surprised when the stories of the social benefit and driving license scandals were published, because the same thing happened to her.

In reaction to a few comments from the government benches, Buttigieg insisted that “this is not an allegation, this is a fact.”

She also said how after she was accused in parliament of skipping queue by Fearne, outside of the parliamentary chambers, Fearne admitted that it was not true that Buttigieg approached him. Buttigieg said that she challenged him to go back into the parliamentary chambers and excuse himself, however, he did not do so.