Shadow Environment Minister Jason Azzopardi has called for an urgent debate to establish the date when the revised policy in this sector will come into force. 

The request was made in a letter which Dr Azzopardi sent to Labour MP Alex Muscat, who chairs the Parliamentary Committee for the Environment and Planning.

However, Mr Muscat noted that he would only convene the committee whenever such request is made by the “competent authorities”.

This response triggered an immediate reaction from Dr Azzopardi who complained that this was tantamount to sidelining the Opposition’s request. 

In his letter to Mr Muscat, Dr Azzopardi said the revised policy had been in the pipeline for more than a year. 

Since then, a document outlining the proposed changes in this policy was published for public consultation – a period which closed last month, on June 14, he added.

Revised policy had been in the pipeline for more than a year

“In view of the fact that during this interim period the Planning Authority is still deciding applications on the basis of the existing policy which had been rolled out in 2015, I believe that the committee should debate the date when the new revised policy will come into force,” Dr Azzopardi said.

The MP was prompted to take this course of action as the Planning Authority was set to decide on an application for the construction of a massive fuel station on a tract of agricultural land on Thursday.

The application was rejected in a unanimous vote.

The application sought to relocate a decommissioned kerbside facility in Valley Road, Msida, to a site along Mdina Road between Ta’ Qali and Mount Carmel Hospital, in Attard.

Its close proximity to the Pit Stop fuel station meant that this application fell foul of the existing policy as it was within 500 metres of another facility.

Under the proposed policy this minimum distance would be trebled to 1,500 metres.

Furthermore, though the station’s proposed footprint of 3,000 square metres was within the existing planning parameters, the new policy limited the maximum size to 1,000 square metres.