Tourism Minister Clayton Bartolo said that an electoral promise to up the National Film Fund Budget will come by the end of the legislature, amid criticism of government spending on a film festival while local producers are left in the lurch.
Maltese film producers have criticised continued lavish spending on the Mediterrane Film Festival while the government has so far failed to deliver on upping the budget of the National Film Fund from €1 million to €2 million.
On top of this, industry professionals say they have not been able to access these funds, saying that it has been distributed “haphazardly or not at all” in the past few years.
In comments to Times of Malta, Bartolo said that spending on the film festival and the disbursement of the film fund should not be conflated as they were designed to do different things.
While the film fund helps local film-makers in their craft, the film festival serves as a vehicle to bring more film production to Malta.
“Those who criticise have to decide what they want, we can either have an industry that did not work, as it did in the part when the PN administration was going to turn the film studios into a fish farm, or we can have an industry like we do today, which is working on films back to back,” Bartolo said.
He added that the film festival also provided the opportunity for local filmmakers to attend masterclasses given by industry professionals for free.
Asked why the government had yet to up spending on the film fund, Bartolo said the promise could not be called unfulfilled because the end of the legislature in which the government is expected to fulfil its electoral pledges has not yet expired.
“Electoral pledges are fulfilled throughout a legislature. One cannot say the promise was not kept if the legislature has not yet ended,” he said.
“But year after year, we continue to implement our electoral manifesto and have increased funds and other help through various budgets, so one should wait and see how we keep progressing over time.”
Minister’s wedding held in different location to film awards
Asked about his wedding being held at the same venue as the film festival’s award ceremony, Bartolo reiterated that he made no use of public funds for his wedding.
The National Audit Office has been asked to investigate the minister’s wedding ceremony at Manoel Island, following concerns that public funds may have been abused.
In a complaint, ADPD said that substantial costs had been spent from the public purse to set up for the awards ceremony and that the timing of the minister’s wedding, a day before the ceremony, was suspicious.
Bartolo said that his wedding ceremony was not held at the same place as the film awards, saying that his wedding was at the Couvre Port, which is on public land, while the awards took place inside the Fort Manoel itself.
“I want to be accountable to all. I understand that I am a public person and, therefore, must be held accountable more than an average person. But I did everything as I should have,” he said.
Bartolo said he welcomes the investigation and will cooperate with the Auditor General, urging him to start looking into it as quickly as possible.
The minister said, however, that he expects reciprocal standards to be upheld and that when it is confirmed that he did nothing wrong, he expects all of ADPD’s administration to resign.