'Alarming' increase in crime

Opposition home affairs spokesman Gavin Gulia said yesterday that the crime rate in the first 10 months of this year was already higher than the record established in the whole of the year 2000, but the government was showing no vision on how to tackle the problem.

Dr Gulia was speaking during the budget debate on the Ministry of Justice and Home Affairs.

He said it was a statistical fact that since 1999 crime - of all sort - had been on the increase.

The minister of home affairs sometimes claimed that the crime rate growth was lower than under the Labour government, but it should be recalled that in mid-1997 a reform was made in the way crime statistics were compiled so that even the smallest of crimes was recorded. The first full year of the new system was 1998 and that, therefore, should be used as the yardstick for comparative purposes.

In 1998 there were 12,379 criminal acts; in 1999 there were 13,452; in the year 2000, there were 14,410; in the year 2001 that dropped slightly to 12,787; in 2002 there were 13,967 crimes and this year up to October there were 14,818 crimes. Yet the minister was not showing concern, attributing the increase to petty crime such as the theft of mobile phones, as if that was not serious.

While crime had to be seen as a whole, it was not true that the rate of serious crime had dropped, as was sometimes claimed. Cases of bodily harm in 2002 rose by 43 per cent and this year by 73 per cent compared to 1998. Fraud cases rose by nine per cent last year and this year by 18 per cent over 1998. Sexual offences were down six per cent last year and this year they were up 34 per cent over 1998. Prostitution in 2002 increased 150 per cent compared to 1998. Attempted offences this year compared to 1998 were up 102 per cent. Offences by public officers were up by 70 per cent last year and again this year over 1998.

Unfortunately there appeared to be no vision on how to tackle this alarming situation.

Turning to the drugs problem, Dr Gulia said there was no doubt that the cause of theft in many cases stemmed from drug abuse.

Despite significant drug finds, the market was clearly well supplied and the number of drug victims was growing. Clearly more surveillance was needed around Malta's coast.

Another problem which needed to be tackled was the problem of prostitution. This was a problem which had evolved. It was no longer just the case of prostitution in well known areas, but organised prostitution with an international dimension, including girls from Russia, Ukraine and other countries. Nothing was being done about it.

As for illegal immigration, the opposition backed the government's detention policy, but some migrants had been under detention for two years, which was too long. And the mass escapes of illegal migrants ridiculed the detention policy. The government needed to ensure that the migrants were detained in reasonable conditions, particularly at police headquarters. In this context, the funds being allocated for this purpose, including Lm300,000 for the police, was welcomed. There was clearly a need for the Office of the Refugees Commissioner to be better funded and more adequately staffed so that applications for refugee status could be considered in greater depth and "intelligent" reasons were given when they were rejected.

Concluding Dr Gulia said there had been injustices in promotions of police superintendents. Last year the opposition had complained how two superintendents had been passed over in promotion to assistant commissioners. The two who were passed over had been promoted assistant commissioners recently, at last.

But a major foul was made in the promotion to superintendents. Some of the officers clearly deserved their promotion, but one of them clearly did not. He had been investigated for serious matters three times. The first was over how, two years ago a thief who was well known to the police was caught red handed but somehow not arraigned and the stolen objects which were in the possession of the police were returned to their owners. In a more recent case, stolen motorcycles were also returned to their owners by the police and an arraignment was made only after a report reached police headquarters. Had those responsible for that theft not pleaded guilty, the case could have collapsed since the motorcycles had been returned. The third case was similar, with stolen objects being returned without proper investigation by this officer.

Dr Gulia said that while this officer had been promoted, a respected police inspector was being forced to resign for reasons which were unknown, a case which reflected two weights, two measures.

At the beginning of the sitting, Dr Gulia moved for a deduction of Lm1 from the minister's salary as a sign of no confidence. The motion was defeated.