Absence of pairing will not hinder government, Borg insists

Deputy Prime Minister Tonio Borg said today that should no pairing agreement be reached with the opposition, the government was prepared to change the way Parliament operated so as to ensure that while parliamentary scrutiny was not diminished, the government ‘s own programme was not hindered.

Dr Borg was speaking at the opening of a three-day meeting of the PN national council, which is discussing the result of the March 8 general election.

His comments came just a day before Parliament meets for the first time tomorrow. The government has a one seat majority in the 69-member House.

Pairing is an arrangement where opposition MPs are ‘paired’ to government MPs and would not vote in the House if the government MPs are away on official business. The opposition has said it will consider pairing on a case by case basis until a new MLP leader is elected in June.

Dr Borg said the government would do its best to reach a pairing agreement with the opposition, but failing that it would be prepared to change the way Parliament operated so that it could implement the people’s mandate, even when ministers needed to be away for meetings in the EU or other fora.

(The government has already indicated that in the absence of pairing, parliamentary sittings would be held in the morning and evening on Tuesdays and on Wednesday mornings. In the past legislatures sittings were held in the evenings, Mondays to Wednesdays)

Dr Borg, who is Leader of the House, said he would also like to see Parliament more open to public scrutiny. The people, he said, should be better able to follow the way the House functioned.

The general council meeting was opened by PN general secretary Joe Saliba, who argued that one of the major reasons why the PN won the election and Labour lost was because the latter was sure of victory and the PN feared defeat and therefore chased every vote.

The PN had also prepared a better electoral programme, it had an effective electoral campaign, and it was led by a dynamic leader.

But despite the victory, achieved in difficult circumstances, Mr Saliba said the PN should not be afraid of change while performing its role as the party in government.