Opposition calls for ruling over cancelled meeting

Report by Matthew Charles Zammit

Opposition whip David Agius tonight requested the Speaker of the House Anglu Farrugia to give a ruling after claiming that a family affairs committee meeting was cancelled a full day before it was due tonight.

MP Joe Cassar explained that a meeting with the University of Malta's Faculty of Social Well-Being head of department Angela Abela regarding the Civil Union's Act was cancelled by the parliamentary committee chairperson and Labour MP Anthony Agius Decelis claiming that there was no quorum, 24 hours before the meeting was supposed to take place.

In an email sent by the committee's clerk yesterday afternoon, committee members were informed that Agius Decelis called off the meeting because of a lack of a quorum. The email advised MPs that the meeting would be rescheduled to a later date.

In his intervention, Cassar said that he believed that the meeting with Angela Abela, the Head of the Department of Family Studies in the Faculty of Social Well-Being, was "important to analyse the situation" in regards to the draft civil union act which envisages gay adoptions.

"Is it possible that a meeting is called off because somebody believes that there was going to be a lack of members to satisfy a quorum?" Agius asked the Speaker.

In reply, government whip Carmelo Abela first reprimanded Agius for asking for a verbal ruling instead of a formally written request.

Abela also said that a prior list of all those parties interested in such a discussion was drawn up by both sides of the House, while lambasting arrangements for the meeting "done in the weekend over the phone" as inappropriate.

Abela added that the members of the Committee available for the proposed meeting were not enough for a quorum to be satisfied due to work commitments, both outside and inside the House.

His counterpart responded that such meeting could still take place, especially after all parties were notified and nobody filed an objection.