During the Falklands War, an inquisitive journalist asked Margaret Thatcher’s controversial chief press spokesman, Bernard Ingham, whether she planned to visit the troops there imminently.

“I knew she did but I couldn’t confirm it because of safety concerns and, yet, I did not want to be accused of lying once it happened,” he would admit much later.

So, he opened his diary and, showing it to the journalist, pointed out there was nothing of the sort listed there. Of course, given the high security risks involved, a planned visit by a prime minister to a war zone would not likely be documented on an agenda inside a press office.

This episode illustrates that ensuring transparency and guaranteeing the right to access to information on the one hand and protecting sensitive and delicate intelligence on the other, could, at times, prove quite tricky.

This was a case where keeping information confidential is justified.

National security, public safety, privacy, legal and judicial processes, certain economic and trade data and ensuring diplomatic relations are not damaged are other instances.

However, it is unlikely that all the 750 parliamentary questions that remain unanswered since the last election all fall within any of those categories. Most are probably the result of inertia and, worse, avoiding political embarrassment.

A quarter of all unanswered questions were addressed to the ministry for education, sports, youth, research and innovation, headed by Clifton Grima. He challenges that, saying delays may be due to the fact that he insists his replies must “give a clear picture regarding what was asked”.

Clayton Bartolo’s ministry follows with 77, and Anton Refalo’s and Aaron Farrugia’s ministries, each with 67 unanswered questions.

According to parliamentary procedure, such questions are meant “to obtain information on a matter of fact within the special cognizance of the member to whom it is addressed”.

Ministries have three working days within which to reply; however, in some cases, not to say often, the answer would be that information was still being compiled or that a reply would be given on another day. Which is really no answer.

It seems that the standing orders in place do not empower the Speaker to order a minister to give a substantive reply. In fact, the first Commissioner for Standards in Public Life, George Hyzler, who had striven to raise the bar even in matters not falling directly within his remit, had referred to the possibility of the standing orders being amended to plug such loopholes.

It is up to the Speaker to push for such amendments. In the past, he did call for prompt replies, noting that parliamentary questions were a means whereby parliament can keep the government in check.

If he had felt comfortable ordering journalists in late 2014 to name the MPs tabling parliamentary questions when reporting about them, he would surely deem it his duty to find ways and means to make ministers reply.

Of course, that is easier said than done given the government’s reluctance to dish out information. It continues to ignore the spirit of the Freedom of Information Act and it has become a habit – almost policy – for ministries and government entities to ignore searching questions by the independent media and resorting to pick-and-choose replies.

The right to seek information from a ministry and holding such ministry accountable are, of course, two fundamental principles of parliamentary government. Transparency and accountability – two essential ingredients in the good governance recipe – are, however, not a forte of the Robert Abela administration.