Prime Minister Robert Abela on Wednesday morning was evasive on whether Labour MP Rosianne Cutajar should be removed from the Labour parliamentary group in the wake of shortcomings found in a report by the Standards Commissioner.

He also avoided comment on reports that she is being investigated by the tax authorities for allegedly not declaring income from a property deal.

Cutajar was found to have breached parliamentary ethics in brokering a property deal for Yorgen Fenech while in parliament, without having declared income from that deal.

She denies having done so but resigned as junior minister pending the investigation. That resignation was confirmed this week by the prime minister, after Times of Malta revealed the report's contents.

Abela said the report presented two diametrically opposed claims. Standards Commissioner George Hyzler will be questioned by the parliamentary standards committee on Monday and a decision would then be taken by the committee on whether on not to adopt the report.

There may, or may not, be agreement on the report but one had to respect the institution and follow the process, the prime minister said. 

Tax investigation into Cutajar

As to the tax investigation, Abela said the only fiscal inquiry he could speak with certainty about was one involving Opposition leader Bernard Grech, Abela said. That was a concluded investigation which found evasion of thousands of euro which were only settled when Grech decided to become PN leader. 

Abela made a distinction between Cutajar's ethical breach, which found that she had not declared income pocketed from a property deal as part of her MP's declaration of assets, and a tax probe into the matter. 

The tax department was free to investigate what it saw fit and any such investigation would be independent, he said.

"If any shortcoming is found, Rosianne Cutajar and anyone else will be treated in the same way as anyone else, without preferential treatment," Abela said.

"We cannot say we trust our institutions and then politicise such matters," he added. 

Prison deaths

Asked whether he had confidence in the administration of the prisons following the death by suicide of a prisoner and other deaths in the past few months,  Abela said he had confidence in the director, Alex Dalli and the management, as well as the magistrate conducting an inquiry into the suicide.