Speaker condemns Paula Mifsud Bonnici for blocking camera, declares case closed

Nationalist Party MP Paula Mifsud Bonnici has received a telling off from parliament’s speaker for having intentionally blocked a PBS camera during a sitting last week.

Speaker Anġlu Farrugia said Mifsud Bonnici had acted “completely deplorably” and insulted the country’s highest institution with the act.

But he noted that Mifsud Bonnici had subsequently apologised for her behaviour and said he now considered the case closed.

The speaker also found no evidence that some audience members in parliament’s strangers' gallery had insulted Mifsud Bonnici, as alleged by her colleague Beppe Fenech Adami.

The Speaker was deciding on two rulings requested by Labour minister Byron Camilleri and PN MP Fenech Adami following the incident, which capped a heated and tumultuous evening in parliament last week.

Mifsud Bonnici, who was serving as PN whip during the sitting in the absence of Robert Cutajar, stood in front of a PBS camera to block its view of Prime Minister Robert Abela wrapping up his response to Opposition Leader Alex Borg’s budget reaction speech.

She did so because she believed the prime minister had overrun his time limit and was being allowed to continue speaking. She later apologised for the act, saying she had “acted instinctively”.

In a ruling issued on Monday morning, Speaker Farrugia noted that parliament had unanimously agreed to allow PBS cameras to film the speech that day. There was also agreement to have the speech translated into sign language for the hearing-impaired.

By blocking the camera, Mifsud Bonnici also prevented the hearing-impaired from following that part of the speech, because the sign language feed was also cut off, the Speaker ruled.

Having censured the PN MP for the act and declaring the case closed, the Speaker noted that whenever MPs disagree with an issue concerning parliamentary procedure, there are standing orders which they can refer to when requesting a remedy.