3,200 people attend 30-hour public consultation meetings

3,200 people - Maltese, Gozitans and foreigners residing in Malta - attended the 15 public consultation meetings organised by the Office of the Prime Minister themed 'a government that listens'.

The meetings, total of 30 hours, with the 23 members of the Cabinet spanned over four weeks. It is calculated that 600 interventions from the general public were made.

Addressing the press briefing on the public consultation meetings, Head of Government Communications Kurt Farrugia and his deputy, Matthew Carbone, also announced that a meeting of the Cabinet will be held in Marsaxlokk next week.

For the first time, the Prime Minister and his ministers will be holding a Cabinet meeting outside the walls of Auberge de Castille, a policy which also forms part of the Labour electoral  programme.

Mayors of the surrounding locality will attend the first part of the meeting. Such Cabinet meetings will be held "periodically".

"Ministers which were initially worried about holding the public meetings changed their minds after they realised what a positive experience it had been," Farrugia said on the public consultation meetings.

With an electoral pledge to hold such meetings every six months or so - the next one planned for January 2014 - Farrugia admitted the challenge was to avoid a repetition of the complaints and concerns raised by the public.

Meetings apart, an email address - [email protected] - for members of the general public was set up, via which they could continue sending in their concerns, suggestions and complaints.

The OPM was also looking at how social media could be utilised in a bid to further improve the consultation meetings.

"Social media has an important role to play and we can make it easier for the public to follow also through online streaming and Facebook chats," Farrugia said. 

On his part, Carbone gave a breakdown of the salient points which emerged from the meetings. He said that every ministry and parliamentary secretariat was following up on the interventions made, where in some cases individuals were also contacted to provide further information.

"It was a positive experience that people from all walks of life could come here and speak out on their concerns or to put forward proposals," Carbone said. "People with conflicting views did not hold back from making their interventions, paving the way for a health dialogue."

Carbone added that were also cases where the respective ministry would have had to explain to concerned individuals that what was impossible, could not be made possible.