Justice minister dubs new Tribunal ‘one of Parliament’s greenest laws’

A draft law to set up a tribunal that will rule on appeals against decisions taken by new Planning and Environment Authorities will be “one of the greenest laws that Parliament will pass in this legislature”, Justice Minister Owen Bonnici said.

He was speaking in Parliament during the second reading of a Bill to set up the tribunal, one of three Bills through which the Malta Environment and Planning Authority will be separated into two authorities. 

While the previous legislation specified that the members of the Environment and Planning Review Tribunal are to be appointed by the President on the advice of the Prime Minister, the new law simply states that members of the tribunal are to be appointed by the Prime Minister.

However, Bonnici pointed out that tribunal members will be granted a five-year security tenure, meaning that the government won’t be able to expel them from their posts barring proven misbehaviour. Moreover, they will not be eligible for reappointment after five years in office.

“We want the people to have their minds at rest that the tribunal members won’t rule cases in favour of the government so as to curry favour once their tenure is drawing to an end,” Bonnici explained.

The Tribunal will have the right to suspend the granting of a planning permit, pending the result of an appeal. However, it will only have 30 days to decide whether to suspend a permit and only three months to make a decision in cases involving the suspension of a permit.

Green NGOs will be automatically considered as “interested parties” in cases where an appeal is presented against an application subjected to an Environmental Impact Assessment or an Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control Permit. This will give them an automatic right to appeal against major projects, whereas they can currently only appeal in cases where they are registered as objectors.

“Despite the words of warning being floated around, the demerger will actually strengthen the position of NGOs,” Bonnici said. “It is not easy to find a balance between planning and the environment. The two are crucial elements for Malta, and god forbid we ever reach an extremist position whereby we ignore either one of them.”

The Opposition once again boycotted this debate, with shadow environment minister Marthese Portelli issuing a last-ditch plea to the government to postpone it until the end of an ongoing public consultation session.

“MPs are obliged to listen to civil society’s call for proper public consultation to be held before the debate,” she said. “How can we debate such important Bills without knowing the views of civil society beforehand?”

However, Bonnici insisted that the Opposition would “gain credibility” if they vote in favour of the demerger on Monday.

Environment Minister Leo Brincat also took a swipe at the Opposition for refusing to participate in the debate, comparing their use of democratic tools to Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras’ recent calling of a referendum.

He described the Bills as “historic” for the environment, arguing that they will give the environment more of an authority than they have ever had.