Regular monitoring of public land concessions needed - Nationalist MP
Contract conditions need to be observed along the years of a concession
A lesson which should be learnt from the current Manoel Island controversy is that there should be regular monitoring of property concessions by the government to private entities to ensure that contract conditions are observed, Nationalist MP Joe Giglio told parliament on Monday.
Speaking on the adjournment, Giglio said he would not go into whether there had been any breaches of the Manoel Island concession agreement, but it needed to be ensured, in all cases of concessions of public property, that contractual and financial obligations were observed along the years.
It was good and interesting, he said, that in the course of the public discussion on Manoel Island, there was agreement that the realities of the year 2000 when the concession was awarded, were different from the current ones.
The fact was that in highly urbanised areas such as Gzira, Sliema and Msida, the people felt hemmed in by construction sites. There seemed to be cranes, construction sites and closed roads everywhere.
He was not against investment, but investment had to be sustainable and in line with the people’s needs for a proper quality of life.
Giglio said the prime minister’s claim that the PN government had granted the concession cheaply to its friends was manifestly untrue and unhelpful spin. The concession was approved unanimously by parliament in the year 2000, the only disagreement between the then government and opposition being on an exemption from stamp duty.
The land was handed over for €90 million, along with a significant groundrent and an obligation for the developers to restore historic sites on Manoel Island and Tigne. With regard to Manoel Island, while restoration had been made on Fort Manoel, it appeared that works had stopped there.
The Nationalist MP said both sides of the House should heed the people’s cry for concessions of public land to reflect current realities and he was grateful to NGOs who had brought this matter to the fore. It was important that decisions were taken in the best interests of the country and its people.