Fourteen families stood in the street, concerned and confused. It was June 2019, and they had all been evacuated from their own homes after a wall adjacent to a construction site next door collapsed.

“The CEO of the Building Regulations Office gathered us in the street and told us: ‘now you need to plan where you’re going to sleep tonight’,” Janet Walker recounted on Sunday.

“I remember telling him: ‘Is that why you came here? To divide families? Why didn’t you come when I filed a complaint about the construction?”

Walker was one of the victims of that Guardamangia construction site collapse. It would be three long years before she and her family would be able to return home.

The Guaradamangia resident is now running for a spot on her hometown’s local council, running on the ADPD ticket.  She was speaking at an ADPD event held outside parliament on Sunday, focused on demanding justice for victims of construction sector calamities.

The ADPD wants clear rules that will lead to, among other things, errant contractors being stripped of their licence to practice; significantly increased fines; local councils to be consulted when high-rises are planned in their localities; and permits for invalidated buildings to be struck off after three months.

“There were 1,300 new building permits issued in 2023, and they expect 14 OHSA inspectors to keep up wiht that. Why create an institution and render it toothless? Now they’re promising 55 more. Is it a pre-electoral promise? Didn’t they know before that 14 inspectors is not enough?” ADPD chairperson and MEP candidate Sandra Gauci noted at the event.

Walker addressed the event before Gauci. In her speech, she recalled how she had done all she could to warn authorities about the dangerous works going on next door.

“I  spoke to the OHSA, and they told me they’re only focused on work safety issues. I spoke to the Planning Authority, and they told me to speak to the Building and Regulations Office (BRO, now superseded by the Building and Construction Authority). I spoke to the BRO and they told me to hire an architect and lawyer,” Walker said.  

“I got myself an architect and a lawyer. The architect advised the developers next door not to excavate flush with my wall. They ignored the architect and lawyers’ letters and dug right beneath us,” Walker said.

ADPD chairperson Sandra Gauci speaks at a party event in Pieta. Photo: ADPD

Six weeks later, her worst fears would come true.

“A noise shook the entire place. I heard a commotion in the kitchen, where my mother, sister and seven-year-old niece were... there was yelling across the entire apartment block. My sister literally carried her daughter outside and told her ‘whatever happens, keep running outside’. Then she helped our mother get out.”

In that case, everyone was evacuated safely, and nobody was hurt. Other construction site tragedies that would follow in the ensuing years would prove more fatal.

Following a public inquiry into the most recent construction collapse death – that of 20-year-old worker Jean Paul Sofia – the government has pledged to overhaul construction site regulation. Some regulators have resigned.

Walker said it’s not enough.

“If the way forward is to just have people resign, then things are not going to get better,” she said on Saturday.

The event was also addressed by Raphael Borg, a citizen who asked to speak in impromptu fashion. 

His grandparents, he said, had suffered a similar fate, with their property “drowning” because of neighbouring construction by large-scale developers back in 2005. 

“Did changing our flags from blue to red really change anything? The bigshots still control everything,” Borg said. “I never intended to speak before a microphone, but I have to make myself heard,” he said.