Government, opposition disagree over Gozo's regional status

The government and the opposition have clashed once again over another area of the negotiations with the EU - the status of Gozo as a region.

While the government is saying that Gozo will be considered a region, the Labour Party claims this would not be the case just because the government would be compiling separate statistical data for Gozo.

At a social activity in Xaghra on Tuesday, Alfred Sant denied the EU had accepted Gozo as a region. Brussels had only given the right for the compilation of statistics for Gozo separately from those for Malta.

In a statement yesterday, Foreign Minister Joe Borg and Gozo Minister Giovanna Debono said the MLP was trying to invent a new reality with the aim of creating confusion.

"All indications point to the fact that Malta would be considered as a region under Objective 1. This means that Malta would be a region eligible for the maximum amount of funds from the EU.

"The government has ensured that in the Single Programming Document - which will explain how Malta plans to spend EU funds after membership - there will be a separate priority entitled The Regional Development of Gozo, which will deal with Gozo's special needs.

"Consultations are going on with the European Commission about the measures - which will be negotiated separately - that would provide for the specific needs of Gozo, in particular its double insularity, its fragile environment, the small size of the island and its population density as well its extremely limited resources," Dr Borg and Ms Debono said .

When contacted, the Malta-EU Information Centre said that Gozo was being considered a region at NUTS 3 level.

"This means that statistics would have to be collected on a regional basis for Gozo and not as one country.

"On Monday, core negotiating group chairman Richard Cachia Caruana said on the closure of the Regional Policy Chapter that the first GDP statistic for Gozo put it (the GDP) at just 71.1 per cent of the Maltese national average, which in turn means just 55 per cent of the EU average," MIC said.

NUTS stands for Nomenclature of Territorial Statistical Units. NUT 1 refers to whole countries or very large regions such as Scotland or the whole of Bavaria. Such regions should have a minimum of three million people.

NUT 2 refers to large regions usually under autonomous control with a population of at least 800,000 such as Lancashire in the UK and Liguria in Italy.

NUT 3 refers to smaller regions that contain a minimum of 50,000 inhabitants such as Dublin, Paris and Rome.

"Malta and Gozo are classified as one region under NUTS 1 and 2 and as two separate regions under NUTS 3," MIC said.

MIC said that the government had originally requested that Gozo be considered as a region at NUTS 2 and 3. The original request by the government had even divided Malta into two separate regions, north and south. Further discussions with the EU indicated that Malta's request could not be met.

Would Gozo receive funds directly for its needs?

"No. Funds will be allocated to Malta and Gozo as one unit. It will be up to the Maltese authorities to see how these (funds) will be allocated, spent and all accounts verified.

"The Regional Policy Directorate at the office of the prime minister was set up for this end...

"If Gozo had to be allocated separate funds from Malta, it would have had to incur the cost of setting up the necessary administrative capacity to administer these funds.

"This would not have been cost effective and that is why the regional policy directorate was set up to coordinate Malta's funding programme with the relevant ministries," MIC said.

The Times put a number of questions to the Delegation of the European Commission to Malta about the subject.

The delegation emailed this answer: "Unfortunately, because of our working hours, we didn't have the time to answer directly to your questions as requested.

"Anyway, please find attached the answers to similar questions which we have already given to one of your colleagues."

The colleague the delegation referred to is a journalist working for a Maltese language daily who had asked different questions.