Earlier this week, in what was a surprise announcement, Prime Minister Robert Abela declared that the government will turn White Rocks into a national park.

The White Rocks complex in Pembroke was once a military barracks built in the 1960s, but was later turned into a holiday complex. It has since fallen into disrepair. Development of the site was initially attempted back in 1990s by a Nationalist government but failed to gain any momentum and was put on hold. In 2010, there was an attempt to develop the site as a sports village but, again, this did not gain enough interest. In June 2014 the idea of a White Rocks project was reinitiated, but nothing became of it and to this day remains in disrepair.

Now the Prime Minister has declared the government's intention to turn the site into a national park.

Speaking in Parliament on Tuesday, during his reply to the 2026 Budget, the Prime Minister mentioned Manoel Island but then mentioned a second project.

"It is not enough that we are going to implement the biggest and most beautiful environmental project on Manoel Island. I believe that instead of one national environmental project, we should have two," he said, which will be implemented simultaneously.

The Prime Minister said that this second such project will be White Rocks. "I will take the decision which no other government before this one had the courage to take. I believe that our country should change the decision and its direction regarding this land."

"We will be cancelling the public call that was issued for the development of this land, and instead we will give this land to the people in the form of an open and green park," he said about White Rocks. Abela also said that the government wants to give a perpetual guarantee that the land will never be built.

The announcement is one which is definitely worthy of being welcomed.  White Rocks has been a question mark for many years, having fallen into disrepair and abandonment. It being turned into a national park is the best possible outcome.

One aspect which is curious is the timing of the announcement.  This is a project of significant scale and of great importance as far as green open space goes: yet there was no mention whatsoever of it in the Budget speech read out by Finance Minister Clyde Caruana just a week before.

Instead, the announcement was left to the Prime Minister.  It’s an odd one – you would think, at least based on how things are usually done, that the big announcements are reserved for the Budget speech, where all eyes are on the government.  Perhaps Abela wanted to ensure that his own speech gets as much – if not more – attention than that of his counterpart Alex Borg the day before, and therefore saved this important announcement for then.

Political games aside, the project is a good step forward as far as open spaces go.

It cannot be something done in isolation, though.  If the government is truly committed to improving Malta’s environment it needs to go even further beyond major projects such as Manoel Island and White Rocks.

Unfortunately the project announcements come within the backdrop of the government proposing reforms to Malta’s planning sector.  The reforms have been roundly panned and have been described as a “developer’s wishlist”, forcing the government to open a public consultation and go back to the drawing board.

It doesn’t seem like calls to withdraw the reform bill completely are going to be heeded, but one hopes that the new version which emerges from the ashes of the consultative process keeps the environment at the forefront of its thinking.