It is possible to “occasionally” slip the odd person through the waiting list for free childcare, according to a government customer care official.
Ray Mizzi, a former customer care official in Prime Minister Robert Abela’s office, referred to the possibility in WhatsApp chats with former Transport Malta licensing director Clint Mansueto.
Mansueto was chasing Mizzi for help to get his two children into a particular government-run childcare centre.
“They told me there is a waiting list,” Mansueto said in a June 2018 chat.
The childcare conversation, interspersed with requests by Mizzi to “help” selected driving candidates as part of a Transport Malta racket, continued over the next few months.
In July 2018, Mizzi promised to “check” what was going on with Mansueto’s childcare request.
The following month, Mansueto sent the OPM customer care official another reminder about his two children being on the waiting list.
Mizzi promised the Transport Malta official that someone was working on his case.
“The problem is the system exposes if someone is bumped up, occasionally the odd person is slipped through, but two is not easy. Would another locality close by be ok?” Mizzi said.
The conversation between the pair subsequently turned to other government-run schools in the vicinity.
Mizzi, who is now an aide to Social Policy Minister Michael Falzon, did not respond to a request for comment about his claims that people can be moved up the childcare waiting list.
Prime Minister Robert Abela last week came out with a ringing endorsement of customer care officials who “helped” selected driving candidates more easily obtain a driving license.
Abela said his only disappointment was that certain customer care officials could do more for people.
The prime minister’s comments were slammed as an “invitation to anarchy” by the Malta Employers’ Association.
Insurers and doctors also raised alarm about the danger of having unqualified drivers on the road.
Times of Malta exposed how top government officials, including then Transport Minister Ian Borg, passed on the names of driving candidates who should be “helped”.
Abela’s assistant Rachel Debono, who at the time was a Transport Malta official, also engaged in the practice.
WhatsApp chats show how Debono would even ensure that certain candidates were told beforehand not to let their instructor accompany them on the test.
Mansueto had previously highlighted in one chat with Debono how the instructor’s presence during a test had made it impossible to give a pass to a candidate who drove badly.