Muscat calls for wardens system which 'educates'

Labour leader Joseph Muscat said last night that the wardens system should be there to educate, not to serve for tax collection.

Replying to questions at a party activity in Zurrieq, Dr Muscat said local councils needed to reduce bureaucracy, and Labour councillors should, in their decision-making, always take the side of the people. Mayors and councillors also needed to be more accessible to the people.

When he spoke on local law enforcement, Dr Muscat said discipline had to be exercised, but it was unacceptable that a driver who stopped and dashed into a shop for a minute was immediately fined by a warden keen on achieving his quota of fines.

The wardens should not have such quotas and the people were already burdened enough with taxes and should not have to pay more, Dr Muscat said. The local enforcement mechanism therefore needed to be reformed.

Dr Muscat also refered to speed cameras, saying that while he agreed with them, enforcement should also be 'in favour of the citizen". Through fines, the people were ending up subsidising a few companies, he said.