Labour stand on Mepa reform

Ian Cilia (Labour Party Missing An Opportunity, January 26) seems to have been misguided by the Prime Minister's customary negative assessment of the Labour Party's reaction to Mepa reform.

After Joseph Muscat announced the establishment of an independent consultative working group on the said reform in 2008, the members immediately got down to an intensive series of consultations with key stakeholders under the chairmanship of architect Reuben Abela, the findings of which were presented to the PL parliamentary group, which in turn gave them considerable weight when crystallising its position.

The PL has already given its preliminary public reaction to the government's proposals.

It has made at least four major policy proposals ranging from the setting up of two separate authorities - one for planning and another for the environment - to the introduction of spatial planning instead of the archaic structure plans; to EU best practices and the establishment of a parliamentary scrutiny committee modelled on the Public Accounts Committee structure, chaired by the opposition to vet the competence and integrity of those appointed to decision-making boards in Mepa as well as their policy implementation.

The government's reaction has been weak-kneed, to say the least.

Rather than Labour missing an opportunity as implied by the correspondent, the moment the Bill comes up for discussion in the House not only shall we be actively contributing to the second reading debate but we have already agreed internally on a comprehensive set of amendments that we shall be formally submitting to the House at the committee stage. Only then will we be able to tell how really open to suggestions and constructive criticism the government may happen to be.