The planning system is profoundly flawed – as demonstrated yet again by the Planning Authority’s approval of the now infamous Qala ODZ application – but nobody ever takes responsibility for it. Who will shoulder the blame?
Not the PA’s executive chairman, Johann Buttigieg. He has just jumped off the sinking ship he helped to create. He will now leave behind a colossal mess of planning disasters for the nation to live with and move on to another plum job.
The 2016 reform of the former Mepa, under his watch, has been a complete failure on the ground. We are all living with the consequences.
The blame won’t be shouldered by the Planning Board either, the majority of whose members voted in favour of ruining the Qala countryside. MEP Alfred Sant has rightly demanded a public, detailed explanation of the reasons that led to the decision but it is unlikely to come. The lack of obligation to explain decisions is in fact one of the major flaws in the system.
Planning Commission chair Elizabeth Ellul, a member of the board, noted that the policy was leading to bad outcomes and should be revised. That is a slippery defence. If the policy is deeply flawed, it is because the people who drew it up did a bad job of it. Ellul herself drafted that policy, which has been questioned and criticised repeatedly ever since its approval in 2014. She cannot shrug that off.
Infrastructure Minister Ian Borg has been at pains to deflect blame, excusing the 2014 policy on the basis that it has “helped farmers” and – attempting to portray himself as the true doer – criticising the PA panel tasked with redrafting the policy for failing to meet frequently enough. As minister in charge of the PA, it was his responsibility to make sure a policy being blatantly used as a basis to build countryside villas over dilapidated ruins was rewritten with urgency. He failed to do that.
Last but not least, the Prime Minister. In a response to this controversial permit that takes disingenuousness to the next level, Joseph Muscat too blamed the PA, when it was his own appointees who voted for the villa. He even claimed that the Qala decision was technically correct, when this is not obvious at all, as shown by research carried out by Times of Malta. He recently also pointed fingers at developers, calling on them to show less ‘greed’ – when the government has actively fuelled the construction mania.
Nationalist MP Marthese Portelli denounced the entire PA and resigned her seat. She has also rightly called into question the very notion of politicians being part of the board.
The PA must be governed by a legal framework that gives results in the public interest. If this is not happening, it must go back to the drawing board. For one, the composition of the board should be revisited so that the PA can become independent in practice.
However, the system can only improve if those in charge are ready to be accountable for their actions. The Prime Minister cannot simply shift responsibility. The government which he leads is responsible for the environmental disaster around us and Qala is only the latest casualty.
It is the government’s duty to ensure that state regulators carry out their work in full consideration of the common good.
If they fail, that failure is owned by the government.