Two wrongs don’t make a right

Prime Minister Joseph Muscat's announcement that he intends to appoint MPs from both sides of the house to chair government boards - possibly even authorities - should really set alarm bells ringing at every level of public administration.

First off, it can very easily be interpreted as a move to undermine the authority and independence of Parliament itself. Muscat himself explained that he wanted Members of Parliament to have "a greater role in the decision-making process." But this is quite frankly nothing to do with the job of a Member of Parliament... whose actual duty is to represent constituents and to loyally serve the interests of the Maltese republic... not, as the prime minister seems to believe, to actually run the administration of the public service (which is a job which falls to others).

This is precisely why the proposal itself is so worrying. Muscat seems to be confusing the role of Parliament with that of the executive, and while both are fundamental pillars of the State (alongside the judiciary) they are very far from interchangeable.

There are in fact fundamentally important differences between the role of government as a whole and that of an individual MP (even if he or she sits with the majority grouping within the House). To suggest otherwise is to betray a worrying lack of proper understanding of the separation of powers, and to do so at a time when Parliament is itself fighting for its autonomy from the executive arm of government - an initiative commenced by former speaker Michael Frendo and continued by his successor Anglu Farrugia - does not exactly bode well for Muscat's declared intention to forge a "Second Republic."

But there is another, even more urgent reason why the proposal should be rejected out of hand: Dr Muscat seems to have completely overlooked the enormous propensity for conflicts of interest such an arrangement will almost certainly create.

A few simple examples should suffice. Would the Prime Minister consider, for instance, appointing a government MP as chairman of the Bank of Valletta (an institution in which the government is the single largest shareholder)? If so, the potential for abuse would be quite simply staggering. Banks are privy to overwhelming amounts of sensitive personal data pertaining to its clients... and MPs have an obvious vested interest in knowing as much about people in their constituencies as possible.

Naturally one would like to assume that a Member of Parliament would be above such a temptation, but apart from the sheer naivety of such an assumption, the fact remains that placing a Member of Parliament within easy access of personal data on a national level is simply too great a risk for any government to take.

It is the equivalent of placing a child in charge of a sweet shop and expecting him or her to resist temptation indefinitely.

The situation becomes even more alarming when one extends the same concept also to authorities which are often tasked with scrutinising the actions and behaviour of government and holding Parliamentarians to account. The very idea that an MP should have a say in such decisions as those taken by the Data Protection Commission, the National Auditor's Office, the Malta Resources Authority, the Broadcasting Authority and so on, will only defeat the long-term interests of such supposedly autonomous institutions to begin with.

In cases where there is need for individual MPs to be involved in this form of decision-taking process, the law as it stands already caters for exceptions. MEPA is one example, where the law itself envisages permanent members to the authority's board being, in fact, MPs by necessity, representing both the government and opposition. The BA is another.

But to extend the same role to actually chair the board at either of those authorities would be an overstep far, far beyond the remit of Parliament as the voice of the electorate; instead, it would be become part of the voice of the executive, which is already over-represented across Malta's entire legislative landscape as things stand.

In fact, the appointment of all such chairpersons normally falls to Cabinet, which technically means that Parliamentarians are already directly involved in the decision-making process, albeit at a safe, arm's-length distance from the decisions themselves.

To shorten that distance to such a degree that members of the executive suddenly take decisions outside the executive's remit is to very evidently court disaster.

As for the idea of involving opposition members in the same way: this is equally reprehensible for another reason. Part of the opposition's job is to hold the executive to account. How can the opposition properly fulfil this role, if its own members are numbered among the same executive?

Lastly it must be said that Muscat's other justification - that is, that the PN is no position to criticise, having likewise blurred the distinction between the executive and other arms the State in the course of its 23 years in power - that is in itself no argument at all.

It is the principle, not the party making the proposal, which is at fault here. As such, it will remain a bad idea whichever side of the house it comes from.