25 student organisations welcomed the public consultation on the reform of the planning appeals system which concluded on Thursday, but highlighted a loophole which allows the Cabinet to allow – at its sole discretion – a development to proceed, even if it is facing an appeal.

In a statement, the organisations said that the reform “is a change that has long been called for,” adding that they are glad to see it reach the table.

The organisations said that the reform answers a real and long-standing injustice.

They noted that as the law stands, a permit can be acted upon while it is still being challenged before the Tribunal and the Courts. Buildings rise, ground is cleared, and uses are established, all before the appeal against them is heard. By the time a permit is overturned, the damage is usually already done and the remedy is worth little. The proposal puts a stop to this. Once a qualifying appeal is filed, works are suspended automatically until the case is finally decided. It is a simple principle, and a correct one. A right of appeal that cannot protect what it is defending is no right at all.

“We will not pretend, however, that this is a great concession. It is the bare minimum. Suspending works while an appeal is pending is the least that any fair system owes the people who use it. It should never have been otherwise, and it has taken far too long to arrive,” the organisations said.

“We also want this reform enacted without the quiet, last-minute changes that so often appear to accommodate powerful interests. Yet one such opening is already written into the text,” they pointed out.

The organisations noted that as drafted, the reform allows the Cabinet of Ministers to switch off the automatic suspension in an individual case, and to let a development proceed while its appeal is still being heard.

“This power is not confined to rare and exceptional cases. It reaches developments the Minister considers to be of strategic significance or of national interest, developments said to touch the interests of Government, and developments where the applicant is the State itself,” the groups said.

“These are broad categories, and most of them turn on nothing more than the Minister's own opinion,” they added.

The groups said that in practice they capture the largest and most contested projects, including those that require an environmental impact assessment.

“A protection that the executive can lift at will, in precisely the cases where an effective appeal matters most, is a protection with a hole at its centre. It should be removed. If it is kept, it must be defined narrowly, placed under real judicial control, and drafted so that no irreversible works can proceed while its use is being challenged,” they said.

The student organisations said that they also wish to highlight the over-centralisation of Malta's planning system, where decision-making and influence remains concentrated within national authorities, appointments and key institutions.

Tied to this, they called for the inclusion of robust accountability mechanisms for each of these proposed fixes to system, including but not limited to the proposed administrative changes, the system-wide digitisation, and the Cabinet's overriding powers, with clear indicators on who the responsible person(s) and/or party is for each of these new changes.

On the note of digitisation, the groups also acknowledged that while this may certainly hasten processes and free up PA backlogs, a fully digital environment risks alienating those with limited digital literacy or resources, and alternatives should be provided to this effect.

“We are clear about the limits of what this reform can achieve. It repairs the procedure, not the substance. When the Tribunal and the Courts decide a planning appeal, they apply the same policies and the same framework that created the problem in the first place. Many of those policies were written to serve development, not the communities and the environment that have to live with it. A permit can follow every rule and still be wrong for the place it is built. Suspension protects the appeal. It changes nothing about the law by which that appeal is judged,” the organisations said.

The organisations said that nor does it reach the failures that residents see most plainly.

“Enforcement must become real. Too often an illegal development is met with a fine that costs less than the profit it earns, or is regularised after the fact, so that breaking the rules becomes simply another cost of doing business. A system that suspends works during an appeal, but does not act against those who build in breach, protects no one. And the authorities that grant permits, police them, and judge appeals must answer to the public, not to the industry they are meant to regulate. Genuine planning justice needs all of this: the policies rewritten, enforcement given real teeth, and institutions made truly independent.”

The organisations said that this is, above all, a question for the young.

They noted that the decisions taken under today's planning regime are, in every way that matters, permanent: A building does not come down. Open space, once lost, does not return.

“It is younger generations who will live longest with what is approved today, and who have the smallest say in approving it. The Malta being built now is the Malta they will spend their lives in. That is reason enough to refuse to stand aside, and reason enough for organisations across our community to speak with one voice,” they said.

“We welcome this reform as a beginning, and only a beginning. We will keep pushing, plainly and persistently, for the deeper reforms that planning justice in Malta still demands,” the organisation concluded.

Adopted and endorsed by the following organisations: Front Żgħażagħ għall-Ambjent (FŻA), Kunsill Nazzjonali taż-Żgħażagħ (KNŻ), Kunsill Studenti Universitarji (KSU), Students For Liberty Malta (SFL Malta), Għaqda Studenti tal Liġi (GħSL), Association of Students of Commercial Studies (ASCS), Moviment Żgħażagħ Partit Nazzjonalista (MŻPN), KSM (Kunsill Studenti MCAST), European Law Students Association (ELSA Malta), Earth Systems Association (ESA), Young European Federalists Malta (JEF Malta), Student Demokristjani Maltin (SDM), Junior Chamber of Advocates (JCA), European Studies Organisation (ESO), LGBTI+ Gozo Għaqda tal-Malti Università (GħMU), Betapsi, Kollettiv Żgħażagħ EkoXellugin (KŻE), Għaqda Studenti tat-Teoloġija (GħST), Malta Association of Dental Students (MADS), Classics and Archaeology Student Association (CASA), History of Art and Fine Arts Students' Association (HOASA), Department of English Students Association (DESA), Malta Health Students Association (MHSA), and Flimkien għal Ambjent Aħjar (FAA).