Gozo is a leading beneficiary

Last Friday, The Times reported that the European Commission dismissed claims on Gozo made by my colleague, MEP Edward Scicluna, in a recent parliamentary question.

Indeed, the Commission burst Professor Scicluna's bubble on EU funding for our sister island after he wrongly insinuated that Gozo lost out on EU funding because the Maltese government had not requested the European Commission to undertake a report on Gozo's special needs.

In his question, Prof. Scicluna referred to the "Declaration by Malta on the Island Region of Gozo" which was annexed to our EU Accession Treaty and asked whether, in line with this declaration, Malta had asked the European Commission to report on the economic and social disparities of Gozo.

Malta had indeed stated in this declaration that it would ask the Commission to report on Gozo's disparities before the EU adopts its budget. The intention was to ensure that Gozo's needs are duly taken into account ahead of each new EU budgetary period until the economic disparity between Malta and Gozo is redressed.

In the event, Malta did not ask for this report when the current budgetary period (2007-2013) was being negotiated in 2005. For during these budget negotiations, Malta's primary concern was to obtain a top priority funding for the whole country and not just for Gozo. As it should have been.

This was achieved when the entire country was classified as a "convergence region" that qualifies for the highest level of EU funding for the full seven-year funding period. It was this achievement that secured an unprecedented financial package that tops the €885 million mark. For both Malta and for Gozo.

Thus, the objective of the Gozo Declaration was still achieved and the report would have had no impact whatsoever on the EU funding allocation assigned for Gozo for the simple reason that, along with Malta, Gozo benefits from the highest level of EU funding in any case.

To put it in other words, with or without the report, Gozo would not have obtained one additional euro because it already qualified for the maximum possible.

Prof. Scicluna may be unaware of these facts. Or perhaps he prefers to ignore them. But these facts are borne out in the Commission's reply to his own parliamentary question.

In its reply, the Commission pointedly drew his attention to the fact that "in view of the fact that the whole country, Malta and Gozo, has remained within the convergence objective (formerly Objective 1 Status) for the 2007. 13 period, the study was not required".

It added tellingly that "full note of the territorial priorities of Gozo was taken" in the EU funding programme for the 2007-13 period.

Not only.

Precisely because of its policy to redress disparities in Gozo, the Maltese government unilaterally took the additional step to allocate a full 10 per cent of our country's financial envelope for Gozo's exclusive use.

It was not required to do so but it did so because this is our policy on Gozo.

This made our sister island an even higher net beneficiary than Malta. Or to put it in other words, on a per capita basis, a Gozitan benefits from more EU funding than a Maltese.

Faced with this clear rebuttal from the Commission, Prof. Scicluna issued a press release which did not even quote the Commission's reply. Instead he misrepresented it and accused the government of incompetence on Gozo, dismissing the "Declaration by Malta on the Island Region of Gozo" as "not worth the paper it's written on".

He went on that Gozo has no special status (the entire country has a special status on EU funding) and that the Gozo declaration is a unilateral declaration by Malta (this is clearly indicated in the title of the declaration itself).

It is a pity that Prof. Scicluna has taken such a partisan approach on an issue that is so clear, namely that, far from losing out on EU funds, Gozo is a leading beneficiary.

But it is also rich coming from a Labour MEP. For where was he during accession negotiations? Certainly not doing his best to get a better deal. Quite the opposite. His party was fighting relentlessly to keep us out of Europe.

So a modicum of common sense would have dictated that, at least on this issue, the Labour Party would be more measured in its tone.

Not just because Gozo is a leading beneficiary of EU funding. But also because its own policy would have yielded zero funds for Gozo.

Ask your MEP on www.simonbusuttil.eu.

Dr Busuttil is a Nationalist member of the European Parliament.