Metsola’s finest hour

Roberta Metsola won the election for the post of President of the EU Parliament on the first round of voting. She will continue to lead the European Parliament for the next two and a half years.

The resounding absolute majority - 562 votes out of 699 - with which Roberta Metsola was again elected speaks for itself.

Metsola was first elected as president of the European Parliament on 18 January 2022, becoming the youngest ever president, the first Maltese to hold the office, and the first female president since 2002.

The President of the European Parliament - who is elected by MEPS from among EP Members - enjoys a broad range of executive and representative powers set out in the Rules of Procedure. Other than these duties, the President’s authority extends to ‘all powers that are necessary to preside over the proceedings of Parliament and to ensure that they are properly conducted.’ Each President is in office for a renewable period of two and a half years.

The large majority that voted for her the second time around reflects the positive opinion of all the MEPs on how she carried out her duties since she was chosen as president of the European Parliament following the death of the incumbent president David Sassoli in 2022.

In attempting to justify their abstention from the vote, Labour MEPs Alex Agius Saliba and Daniel Attard said they disagreed with Metsola on particular issues. Do they think that the 562 MEPs who voted for Metsola agree with her views on everything? The resoning that led to their abstention is obviously flawed.

The other Labour MEP, Thomas Bajada, voted in favour of Roberta Metsola becoming European Parliament President. Bajada explained that he believes that the Maltese people have the responsibility to push one another to high positions, helping the island remain at the forefront. Wise words of a mature man. More so when they are compared with the puerile reasoning that led to the other two Maltese Labour MEPs to abstain from the vote.

The choice of a Maltese President when Malta has just six MEPs is already a big honour for our country. To discard this fact and abstain because one disagrees with what the candidate said - or did - is short-sighted. Not to take part in the standing ovation after the result of the vote was announced is worse: it is simply rude.

On her part, Metsola thanked Europe and her collegues for their trust and committed herself to continue working for Europe.

Addressing the House after she was elected, Metsola said: “Together, we must stand up for the politics of hope, for the dream that is Europe. I want people to recapture a sense of belief and enthusiasm for our project. A belief to make our shared space safer, fairer, more just and more equal. A belief that together we are stronger and we are better. A belief that ours is a Europe for all.”

I am sure Roberta will not just rest on her laurels. Who knows what her next move will be two and a half years from now!

It will not happen again...

The Film Commissioner, Johann Grech, was again at the wrong end of the stick, last Sunday in the weekly column Frans Ghirxi writes in the GWU’s it-Torċa every Sunday.

I have known Frans Ghirxi personally for a very long time and, as fate would have it, in circumstances beyond the MLP-PN permanent ‘dialogue’. He has his political beliefs, of course, but he is no fanatic and can see and understand the other point of view.

Last Sunday his first piece asked how long government will tolerate people shooting at his feet (Se jdum il-Gvern iħalli lil min jisparalu f’saqajh?)

He was referring to the Film Commissioner Johann Grech!

He said that he was flabbergasted when he read that Minister Clayton Bartolo told Johann Grech that the commissioner should not have taken part in a promo film, whereupon the naughty boy assured the minister that it will not happen again!

Ghirxi then asked whether Johann Grech is so insentsitive and went on to say that criticism of Johann was no recent phenomenon. Ghirxi also a recalled the President’s speech on the occasion of the recent Mediterrane Film Festival. The President had emphasised that all money spent by Johann Grech was the people’s money and therefore the principles of accountability and transparency should never be undervalued.

Ghirxi did not mince his words and did his best to prod the government to stop Johann Grech’s antics.

Interestingly, this is the first time that the readers of the GWU papers heard of what the President had said with regards to Johann Grech’s profilgate and unchecked spending.

The fact that Frans Ghirxi wrote in that way goes on to prove that the general criticism of the way Johann Grech operates, is more than justified.

Civil service rules OK

Text describing Liz Truss's mini-budget as a ‘disaster’ was removed from UK government documents on the State opening of parliament last Wednesday, after the former British PM complained that the civil service had breached impartiality rules. This text was in a briefing document outlining more details about laws announced in the King’s address to parliament.

The former prime minister who has now even lost her seat, Ms Truss, complained that references to the ‘mistakes’ of her economic policy, which unleashed chaos in the markets, tanked the pound and caused mortgage rates to skyrocket, were ‘untrue political attacks’.

A spokesperson for the UK Cabinet Office said Simon Case, the head of the civil service, had replied to Ms Truss and ordered that the references be removed.

Ms Truss had written to Mr Case complaining that the language around her actions was ‘more evidence of a lack of civil service impartiality.’

In the letter, Ms Truss urged him to “urgently investigate how such material came to be included in this document, ensure suitable admonishment for those responsible and the immediate removal of such political material from the version of the document on gov.uk”.

We can say that the British are quirky, and they are. But loyalty to the system - rather than to a political party or to a prime minister - always wins.