Guzzling more of your taxes

A teacher who did not vote Labour in the general elections and voted to join the European Union to ensure better governance told me how upset he is at the shabby expensive work carried out at the F.X. Attard Government Secondary Boys' School in Marsa. An air purifier system was installed at the school by the Foundation for Tomorrow's Schools costing Lm200,000 to keep out the heavy pollution produced by the Marsa power station.

The students had a lucky escape recently when the trunking system and heavy slabs were blown off the roof and into the yard just 10 minutes after the school break. Since the system was installed the school has been unable to have proper computer, craft and technology lessons as the power supply is not strong enough. Students and teachers become frustrated and simply while away the idle time. Whenever it rains the system leaks as the work was not done properly. Teachers, students and parents can judge for themselves whether at this school the Foundation has delivered what government promised in setting it up.

In the last few weeks the board of the Foundation for Tomorrow's Schools terminated the contract of its chief executive because financial regulations and procedures had not been strictly observed. For the same reason some officials who were on loan to the foundation were asked to return to the Education Division.

The Foundation was set up in May 2001 to carry out building and maintenance works in government schools. It was launched with the usual pomp and committed itself to implement an eight-year school building programme costing Lm60 million, excluding VAT, commissions to architects and the price of land.

Right from the start I expressed my fear that another foundation was being set up to guzzle more of the taxpayers' money. The foundation was set up at the same time that Finance Minister John Dalli was denouncing the proliferation of agencies, authorities and foundations which cost more than government structures to run, but which did not deliver a better service.

Just over a year ago the Labour parliamentary group asked the National Audit Office to investigate the work of the foundation to ensure that public financial regulations were being respected. The investigation is still being carried out. For months I spoke out in Parliament and outside it, wrote many articles and gave press conferences pointing out how the foundation was breaking government financial regulations. Government tried to dismiss my countless warnings by accusing me of mud-slinging and of being negative and of not wanting better schools for our children.

I stuck to my duty. I do not consider regulations as an end in themselves. But it is not acceptable to bypass these regulations by claiming that that is the only way you can deliver better schools. Institutions run on taxpayers' money must be both efficient and accountable. All taxpayers should follow closely the way Government spends their money - even those who can afford, or have decided to make the necessary sacrifices, to opt out of government schooling for their children.

Unless they evade paying taxes they cannot opt out of paying their tax share to finance the operation and work programme of the Foundation for Tomorrow's Schools. So even those who do not send their children to government schools have a vested interest to monitor how Government spends their taxes on state education.

Every year we pay hundreds of millions of liri in taxes. Health, social care and education funded by these taxes have to deliver better. Poor management of them is detrimental both to those who opt out of them and seek expensive private provision and to those who do not even have that choice. If public services do not improve the debate will move towards lower taxation, self-provision and a fragmentation of our public services.

Efficient and accountable

Although inheriting a 12 per cent budget deficit, the 1996-98 Labour government started addressing the increasing need to create better teaching and learning environments for teachers and students in our schools. During Labour's term of office, capital expenditure on construction, refurbishment, maintenance and equipment rose by over 20 per cent to over Lm3 million a year. The Maintenance Section of the Education Division was restructured to ensure that taxpayers' money would really go to improve school buildings.

In our first months in office in 1996 a management audit was carried out on the Education Division's Maintenance Section. It concluded that the central store set up to supply schools with their needs like paint, light bulbs, water proofing membrane, electrical switches and wires... was like a huge take-away where the material bought out of public funds was considered a freebie. It was estimated that out of every Lm5 of material bought for schools only Lm1 found its way to schools. This was unacceptable and had to change.

The decision was taken to devolve a substantial amount of the funds to school heads. They were empowered to buy directly what they needed for their schools. Management contract agreements were signed with local councils to involve them in embellishing the schools in their communities. The councils in turn contracted out the work to private contractors. At a number of schools refurbishment was carried out in partnership with the Works Division, Drydocks and Kalaxlokk workers.

All these steps started bearing fruit. Many government schools underwent tangible improvements. But it was just the beginning. On the eve of the 1996 election the Nationalist leader, Dr Eddie Fenech Adami, had told me that my criticism of the poor physical environment of our schools was exaggerated, that everything was fine in government schools, and if anything was amiss there was no need to make a big fuss: "It was only a case of a window which did not lock well."

A team of architects who visited most government schools in November 1996 identified Lm4 million worth of emergency works that needed to be carried out to make them safe for teachers and students. Millions more were needed to build new schools, adapt, refurbish and enlarge existing ones. The Labour government was ready to sustain a high expenditure on school buildings.

At least our two short years in office served to put at the top of our national agenda the need to invest in our schools and equip them for the tasks that they have to carry out in the 21st century. But we cannot simply accept government's position that the best and only way this can be achieved is through the Foundation for Tomorrow's Schools.

Government presented this foundation as some kind of modern day five loaves and two fish miracle to secure the necessary money without increasing the burdens on tax payers. The foundation obtained its funds through a government-guaranteed loan from APS Bank. All the talk of having the foundation as a public private-partnership dwindled down to a window-dressing exercise where government is simply transferring the public deficit and public debts from the central government to structures with lower public visibility.

Driven by the real value for money philosophy the Labour Party is committed to efficient and accountable governance that manages to do more with less. Public expenditure must be controlled to ease the tax burden. Taxpayers' money must go where it is needed, not to feather the nest of friends of friends.

evaristbartolo@hotmail.com