You can find our full live blog about the second reading of the government’s proposed amendments to the legal framework for magisterial inquiries below.
The proposed legal amendments of Bill No. 125.
4.05pm – the first Parliamentary Question of this hearing immediately causes an uproar within the House of Representatives. Justice minister Jonathan Attard takes questions from the floor.
Labour MP Katya De Giovanni asks the minister about the unequivocal declaration made by former chief justice Silvio Camilleri.
The justice minister is caustic in his response, arguing that the former chief justice’s “worrying” declaration was “insulting in a fanatical/political manner”.
Quoting the former chief justice’s description of the Labour Party – who lambasted the party for its “arrogant incompetence” and clearly condemned the corruption associated with its governance – the minister clearly took exception.
Further describing the former chief justice’s words as “unworthy” of someone of his stature, the justice minister went on to submit copies of the former chief justice’s public commentary to the House, with the stated intent of submitting these “unworthy” declarations for the public record.
The minister’s statements caused consternation on the Opposition’s benches, with one question echoing out audibly above the clamour: “what else do you expect him to say?”
4.20pm – opposition MP Karol Aquilina asks the justice minister about his earlier declaration.
“Can the minister tell us about one magisterial inquiry which he thinks shouldn’t have happened?”
The justice minister deflects the question, to no avail. Opposition MP Beppe Fenech Adami asks the minister to clarify his attack on the former chief justice – are you angered about the fact that he spoke up about these issues, or are you angry about what he’s saying?
Attard deflects again by talking about the Nationalist Party’s “past attacks” on the police commissioner and the judiciary, earning a call for a point of order from Fenech Adami.
Just 24 minutes into PQs, the plenary session devolves into the typical exercise of shirking accountability in which back and forth mudslinging takes precedence over accountability.
The justice minister is now claiming that he did not attack the former chief justice, and that he is only responding to what he describes as “attacks against the Labour Party and its supporters.”
4.28pm – as always, there seems to be little appetite for finding any common ground across the House.
As the justice minister trumpets the Labour Party’s minor investment in the judiciary and the justice system, he peppers his speech with digs at the Nationalist Party’s failure to invest more in the judiciary – over twelve years ago.
Opposition MP Karol Aquilina goads the minister into talking about “the justice minister’s obsession with former chief justice Silvio Camilleri.”
“Can the justice minister mention one magisterial inquiry which he thinks should not have happened? Or mention one member of the judiciary who did so?” Aquilina insists.
“You know what I condemn and what Aquilina should be talking about? Leaking confidential information from a magisterial inquiry through an organisation like Repubblika!” Attard said in response, a clear reference to Robert Aquilina’s expose about Pilatus Bank.
4.35pm – the second reading of Bill no. 125 – the magisterial inquiry amendments – begins now.
Prime minister Robert Abela takes the floor to immediate fist-stomping from his benches:
“Yes to justice, no to abuse of justice,” the prime minister says, claiming the government is pushing a reform in favour of accountability.
Much like his justice minister, the prime minister’s speech immediately goads the opposition about its objections to the amendments proposed by the government, claiming it has “no credentials to talk about the rule of law.”
This website is of the firm opinion that the prime minister’s view carries little weight considering he is the head of a government that just hit the country’s worst ever record on the Corruption Perception Index.
No word from the prime minister about that, though – instead, he spends the next few minutes talking about the Nationalist Party’s finances and the party’s refusal to submit audited accounts.
4.40pm – the prime minister circles back to magisterial inquiries, only to threaten the Nationalist Party with a magisterial inquiry on the back of claims that the opposition “systematically” withheld payments owed to the taxman.
The prime minister now refers to an old story about opposition leader Bernard Grech’s previously unpaid dues, and doubles down on his threats about asking for a magisterial inquiry and raising facetious questions about “the unexplained wealth” of the opposition leader.
The leader of the opposition is not in the House to respond.
Meanwhile, it is a fortuitous moment to remind everyone that the prime minister’s wealth is the subject of a long list of questions about discrepancies between his asset declarations and his luxurious lifestyle.
4.45pm – the prime minister now turns his guns on what his government has been describing as “the longstanding abuse” of the legal framework for magisterial inquiries, describing the legislative framework as outdated. We’ve written extensively about this subject already.
Misleadingly quoting the Venice Commission’s recommendations to buttress his argument, Abela sets the stage for his government’s drive to push magisterial inquiries out of the reach of the average citizen by forcing potential applicants to go through a reluctant police commissioner first before finally getting to talk to a member of the judiciary.
The prime minister takes a few minutes to list the government’s efforts to implement these recommendations, including changes made to the way in which the judiciary is appointed and installing a dedicated roster of magistrates who respond to requests for inquiries.
For a few minutes, it almost sounds like a government defending a reformist track record, right before Abela describes the “all in the family jamboree” of the Nationalist Party’s days in government and claiming that chief justices appointed at the time were all political appointees.
4.55pm – we had some connection problems here – next update coming in shortly. Meanwhile, the hearing was temporarily suspended.
5pm – temporary suspension of hearing remains in effect. Meanwhile, Times of Malta reports that one of this website’s predictions about court experts leaving Malta out of fear for their own personal safety seems to have come true.
The retired forensic accountant who founded Harbinson Forensics – the firm which was commissioned by an inquiring magistrate to investigate the prime suspects behind the hospitals concession – told the newspaper that he will never return to Malta.
5.05pm – the session resumes, with the acting speaker referring to the uproar which erupted earlier when the prime minister goaded the opposition about its past in government.
After that terse warning, the prime minister’s speech continues.
Robert Abela turns yet again towards the declarations made by former chief justice Silvio Camilleri, taking issue specifically with the latter’s remarks about the government’s evident desire to shield public officials from public scrutiny. Evidently, the former chief justice’s words have left a mark.
The prime minister then claims that “no right that ordinary citizens have today will be removed” with the proposed amendments. This argument deliberately fails to acknowledge that, under the proposed amendments, the right to request such an inquiry is locked behind a six-month window in which one must wait for the police force to act.
When considering the police commissioner’s evident reluctance to investigate organised crime and corruption, the prime minister’s assurances that these proposed amendments will shield citizens from “vindictive” requests to investigate someone under false pretences are not particularly comforting.
5.15pm – the prime minister seems to have brought a list of people to complain about. Now, he turns his attention towards former Nationalist minister Tonio Borg, who has been particularly vocal about the government’s proposed legislative amendments. In a thinly veiled manner, he accuses the newly-minted professor of using his political influence to obtain his title.
All in all, the pattern of the prime minister’s speech seems to amount to meandering between justifying one proposed amendment after the other and dedicating several minutes in between each one to just lambasting the Nationalist Party and all the critics who have forward to dismiss the proposed amendments as legal heresy.
Meanwhile, nobody from the government’s benches named one magisterial inquiry that was unjustified and/or unmerited.
At any rate, we’re now expecting the prime minister to talk about former opposition leader Simon Busuttil and the compelling legal argument he wrote about in a Times of Malta opinion piece.
5.2opm – the prime minister now has the cheek to vaguely refer to “criminals who got away with it” before the Labour government began its campaign to reform the magisterial inquiry system.
“What we are doing today is reforming this legislative framework to ensure that nobody ends up being the victim of bad laws, and that those who deserve it do not get away with it on a technicality,” the prime minister claims.
It seems like the prime minister’s speech will be wrapping up in a few minutes. Following today’s hearing, the bill will be discussed at the level of the relevant parliamentary committee. Eventually, it will be subject to a third and final reading before being signed into law.
The prime minister now disingenuously claims that the permanent secretaries who were named among the accused in the hospitals concession case had “their lives ruined” because of the “crusade” against them in court. He talks about them as if they were martyred.
The Labour Party assiduously avoids any mention of the merit of the charges and the fact that all the former civil servants named in the deal had every opportunity to intervene and revoke the concession.
Instead, he names and shames lawyer Edward Debono, another known critic of the Labour government. He slanders the lawyer by claiming that he illegally takes commission payments from successful legal claims.
5.30pm – a key part of the prime minister’s message is to justify the proposed changes because of the low threshold of evidence that is required for a request for a magisterial inquiry to be approved.
“Rumours at the local club” are enough to initiate an inquiry, the prime minister claims. The argument is completely misleading, as there are documented examples in which even investigative news reports were not enough to satisfy an inquiring magistrate’s discretion, leading to refusals of well-researched requests.
5.35pm – and there goes the Simon Busuttil reference; right on time, the prime minister describes him as “bitter” while claiming that he was “pushed out” by the European People’s Party.
He accuses Busuttil of “systemically destroying the office of the attorney general” through the strident criticism leveled in the office’s regard.
While our prediction that the prime minister would not be able to resist publicly trashing Busuttil turned out to be true, we regret to inform you that our other prediction – that the prime minister’s speech would wrap up in a few minutes – has not turned out to be as true.
Abela seems determined to continue harping on about the Nationalist Party’s failures in government from over a decade ago.
He now pivots back towards trumpeting his administration’s investments in the office of the attorney general and the police force, citing increased capacity at the former and a more modernised force in the case of the latter.
5.40pm – another shouting match between the prime minister and opposition MP Karol Aquilina.
After repeating the claim that Karol Aquilina had “laughed out loud” when disgraced former minister Carmelo Abela shed some crocodile tears in Parliament a few weeks ago, the opposition MP calls for a breach of privilege ruling to deny that he had laughed at Carmelo Abela.
The prime minister also specifically refers to former opposition MP and anti-corruption activist Jason Azzopardi as “the prime liar”, co-opting a term used by Robert Aquilina to describe disgraced former prime minister Joseph Muscat.
5.50pm – the prime minister is finally closing his never-ending speech, claiming that the majority of recent magisterial inquiry requests came at the hands of “the extremist faction of the Nationalist Party”, a term he often uses to refer to practically anyone who calls out the Labour Party for its corruption.
He asks whether he wants a society that, like the Nationalist Party, “destroys the other” or follows the so-called reformist path set out by his party which will give more peace of mind to both the accused and the victims involved in a magisterial inquiry.
The prime minister’s speech ends with another facetious claim about “a racket” engineered by court experts who “made millions” from these magisterial inquiries.
5.55pm – opposition leader Bernard Grech now takes the floor.
“If we ever needed confirmation that the government does not have a moral basis for these amendments, it’s the prime minister’s speech today, in which he spent 55 minutes attacking people,” Grech opened, referring to “those who do not bow to him” as the targets of the government’s attacks.
Grech criticises the prime minister for describing government critics as “evil” people who wish to cause harm and send people to prison, further arguing that he is attacking people who disagree with him.
He accuses the prime minister of being corrupt and knowingly trying to “demonise” the judiciary, “just like you did with former chief justice Silvio Camilleri,” citing the former chief’s “impeccable record” serving the country.
The leader of the opposition is as unequivocal as the former chief justice was – “the prime minister wants to make it almost impossible for a citizen to ask for a magisterial inquiry.”
He also takes aim at the prime minister’s claim that “rackets” have been built around magisterial inquiries costing millions of euros.
“Of course inquiries would cost millions of euros if we have former prime ministers doing things like refusing to give investigators access to their phones!” Grech barked, referring to Muscat’s refusal to give investigators access to his phone.
6pm – the leader of the opposition now turns his attention towards police commissioner Angelo Gafa’ and claims that the latter personally admitted to him that he took no action to prosecute high profile corruption except when ordered by an inquiring magistrate.
“No wonder you want the responsibility to be passed on to someone who answers to you,” Grech jibed.
The leader of the opposition further questions why the government is in such a rush to amend this legislation, accusing the government of being out to save its own skin.
“A prime minister that runs the government via management by crisis,” he adds.
Grech now points out the long list of organisations, individuals, and international authorities that have condemned the proposed changes.
6.15pm – the Nationalist Party leader’s message is focused and clear: while the Labour Party “lives in an ivory tower” and spends its time “focusing on finding ways to save its own skin” from the consequences of corruption, the rest of the country is suffering from soaring cost of living and a dire lack of resources in the healthcare system.
The opposition seeks to project itself as a responsible, credible alternative that would be more acutely aware of the needs of the average citizen.
The argument is extended to the prime minister’s earlier claims about innocent individuals being unjustly dragged through the courts, with Bernard Grech picking up on Robert Abela’s deliberate omission of Joseph Muscat among those ‘innocent’ individuals and calling him out for the government’s role in the hospitals scandal.
The leader of the opposition concludes his speech.
6.20pm – parliamentary secretary for social dialogue Andy Ellul takes the floor to further push for the government’s amendments. Given that we expect him to echo the same arguments previously made by the prime minister, we’ll thin out the word count unless he mentions something which the prime minister hasn’t.
Ten minutes into his speech, we can tell he’s mostly stalling and buying time by repeating the points made in the prime minister’s 55-minute rant, but with more sarcasm involved. Talk about ‘serving kant.’
6.35pm – the parliamentary secretary is now picking on the individual points raised by the Opposition and other strident critics of these proposed amendments, largely ignoring the arguments made about the government’s merited reputation for being the most corrupt administration this country has ever seen.
It’s been two and a half hours, and we are yet to hear one representative of the Labour Party acknowledging the government’s shortcomings.
6.40pm – the parliamentary secretary refers to Jeremy Harbinson’s public statement about refusing to return to Malta, accusing him of depriving the accused of their “sacrosanct right to cross-examination” of the court expert.
“I invite all these brilliant legal minds writing opinion pieces on the Times of Malta to tell us about what they think about these court experts now,” the parliamentary secretary said, referring to dissenting opinions like the ones voiced by former chief justice Silvio Camilleri.
6.50pm – after parliamentary secretary Andy Ellul concludes his speech, opposition MP Karol Aquilina takes the floor.
Describing the prime minister’s remarks as “idiocies”, he derides the claim that these inquiries are being abused to put people through arduous procedures that take forever to conclude.
“Now that some of his ministers are being investigated about abuses they committed, the prime minister wants to change the law. He wants to change it because he has something to hide. No self-respecting prime minister would change the law to prevent an investigation by a member of our country’s judiciary,” Aquilina charged.
The MP also said that he will be sharing more details about which magisterial inquiries were opened by private citizens and why they were opened.
“If it were up to Glenn Bedingfield, he’d sit on every magisterial inquiry and squash it,” the MP quipped furiously upon hearing protestations from across the aisle from the aforementioned Labour MP.
6.55pm – opposition MP Karol Aquilina continues tearing into the government’s proposed amendments.
Reminding the House that the judiciary’s powers are protected by the Constitution, the MP accuses the prime minister of committing “constitutional heresy” by handing over the power to start an inquiry to the police commissioner.
Invoking the spectre of Dom Mintoff’s ire at the courts back when he was still in charge, Aquilina notes that the right to magisterial inquiries was protected even in an era which was so tumultuous that it led to the suspension of the courts’ entire functions.
He refers to the murder of accountant Lino Cauchi, whose mutilated corpse was found in Buskett, noting that the police had refused to open a magisterial inquiry.
“Imagine a person being found chopped up to pieces in a well, only for a magistrate to discover that a magisterial inquiry was not opened,” he says, using the reference as an old example in which the police failed to look into a serious case with political implications.
“The government does not have the electoral mandate to touch the legislative framework that regulates requests for magisterial inquiries,” Aquilina added before concluding his speech.
“This is an irresponsible, anti-democratic law that should open every Maltese and Gozitan citizens’ eyes to the fact that this government is no longer democratic, it is an authoritative, dictatorial government that wants to claim the powers of the state to abuse the laws it wants to abuse and murder whoever it wants to murder,” the MP charged.
7pm – justice minister Jonathan Attard immediately asks the Speaker of the House to order Aquilina to retract the statement. The Speaker asks Aquilina to clarify what he meant by what he said.
“I am referring to the government – if there’s any one of you who thinks I’m referring to them personally, I invite you to explain why,” Aquilina said.
Justice minister Jonathan Attard does not accept the explanation and says that Aquilina claimed the government of the country ordered someone’s murder.
“I already said that this government is behaving in a way which would allow them to get away with murder without anyone holding them responsible for their actions,” Aquilina said.
Today’s Parliamentary hearing comes to a close. The House adjourns until tomorrow.
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