Can we sacrifice one common good for another?

The most recent twist in the Mistra saga has yet again confirmed that the true question before us concerning reform of the Malta Environment and Planning Authority or, for that matter, of the Malta Tourism Authority is: What is it we expect from our politicians in regard to such authorities?

This question does not attempt to play down the various initiatives underway to reform the structure of Mepa. This is necessary. However whatever reforms are put into place, the question referred to above will remain and will apply equally to the whole administrative structure created by the many authorities and parastatal bodies ruling vital aspects of our everyday life.

The new development in the saga is that the government, through its Parliamentary Secretary for Tourism, has chided the chairman of the MTA for giving the impression, when giving evidence before the courts, that his responsibility was for that part of the common good which is tourism; that was his only responsibility - even if another common good such as that of the environment might have been prejudiced.

Not so replied Mario de Marco: The government, being the body principally responsible for the undivided common good of the country, cannot allow one part of the common good to be sacrificed for another. It is the government's role to spell out the general needs of the common good and then it is up to the particular competent agencies to ensure that each carries out its part.

Therefore the MTA was wrong to ignore the environmental implications when implementing its policies in promoting tourism.

So far so rational. However, the worrying aspect of all this is that we have created so many of these authorities and entities that the citizen might be excused in wondering whether the clear line of co-existence between these many authorities allows them to look beyond the specific portion of the common good entrusted to them. Each would re-assert the MTA chairman's position that any other aspect of the common good apart from theirs is not within their competence.

We all want our politicians to remain aloof from matters on which political consensus should exist, opening the way for the creation of authorities to ensure objectivity. Equally, however, we want our politicians to answer for any mishaps which the same authorities may be responsible for. And we know that any perceived inaction by the politician may be repaid in kind when we come to exercise our vote.

This unfortunate state of affairs becomes all the more evident the more the Mistra village case unravels itself. What had started out as a last-minute electoral trump card by the opposition, involving the individual responsibility of an MP, has become proof of the pressing need to draw clear and effective lines of responsibility between the government and the authorities, which may exist in theory but are far from being so in practice.

The government has made a very strong effort to spell out what ought to be this relationship. The parliamentary secretary was crystal clear that the government's policies must not be interpreted in any manner authorising anybody acting on behalf of the common good to sacrifice one common good to attain another.

But it is becoming more and more the case that what we are getting is an impoverished democracy where our representatives are pushed away from our reach as the citizen is faced by a faceless bureaucracy which in turn seems to lose sight of its real aim: the common good of us all.

I, for one, agree with the government's position that the common good is one and indivisible. However, I strongly believe that the true guarantors of it are the elected representatives of the people and that there should not remain any intermediaries between the people and our representatives in the attainment of the common good.

This appeal must not be misunderstood as requiring more government. The appeal is to build a more open democracy such that it is the State through the elected representatives of the people who ensure the common good. The rest is to be passed on to the enterprise and private creativity of the people.

The road, therefore, that must be taken is one of open government, with direct administrative remedies to the citizen should government abuse of its powers, but if the politicians pay for their mistakes let them be directly in control. Otherwise they will pay a high political price for the mistakes committed by others.