House scrutiny committee reports busy year

The scrutiny committee within the House Standing Committee on Foreign and European Union Affairs this year analysed 311 documents released by European institutions.

The number of documents vetted this year is three times the amount scrutinised last year.

The role of the scrutiny committee is to examine each EU document deposited, assess its legal and political importance and determine whether it should be cleared or referred for further debate.

The House committee's 88-page annual report contains a detailed outline of the activities and accomplishments of the committee, composed of chairman Jason Azzopardi and five members of Parliament from both sides of the House.

This was by far the busiest year in the last 10 in terms of the number of sittings held. Apart from the 43 formal official sessions, the chairman also attended several informal meetings with foreign dignitaries. This, the report said, was a big improvement as compared to last year when only 20 meetings were held.

Meetings between the committee and Maltese MEPs were held via videoconferencing.

The report also pointed out that one of the most important functions of the committee is to promote inter-parliamentary exchanges between Malta and other countries. For this reason the committee visited China, the US and Tunisia. Next year the committee plans to visit Croatia, the Czech Republic and the Middle East.