In a two-hour blow-by-blow account, Nationalist MP Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando defended the Private Member’s Bill introducing divorce and the question to be asked in the referendum.

He said there was someone in the PN executive who had tried to use parliamentary procedures so that the Bill would never go for a referendum. He had taken the Speaker’s legal counsel’s advice and proposed a way forward on the issue which guaranteed the debate on the Bill submitted to a referendum.

Dr Pullicino Orlando also admitted that at first he was against the holding of a referendum because he believed minority rights did not have to be subjected to a referendum. He had been convinced, however, by the Prime Minister to submit the divorce question to a referendum.

The debate was a historic one because the Maltese loved the family. Divorce was a civil right enacted by law in Malta in 1975 and given to people who divorced in certain countries. He had information that former Prime Minister Dom Mintoff considered introducing divorce at the time but other considerations prevailed.

Dr Pullicino Orlando claimed he was against divorce and hoped that families remained strong and united.

The Archbishop was right when he said the discussion on divorce was a wakeup call for Malta.

Everyone had a duty to strengthen the concept of the family including legislators and educators. The Church, also through Cana Movement, was doing sterling work.

The state also had an important role to play taking measures which strengthened the family because one of the main causes for marriage breakup was the economic burden which families had to shoulder.

Children suffered psychological stress as a result of family conflict irrespective of whether they went through annulment, separation or divorce. He asked whether legislators had to expose children to stress and possible abuse because of family infighting.

No one was promoting a Las Vegas-style divorce. The Private Member’s Bill, on which the opposition motion was built, proposed the most conservative divorce in the world – that adopted in Ireland.

Those who argued that the referendum question was sugar-coated did not say what was wrong with the Bill. From the first day when together with Labour MP Evarist Bartolo he had presented the Bill, he had called for others to come forward with amendments. There was still the opportunity to amend the Bill after the referendum to improve it. Those who opposed the Bill wanted to impose their belief on others.

The Bill was identical to the Irish legislation and the opposition’s motion reflected this. There, the referendum took place after the Bill was approved in Parliament because divorce had been prohibited under the Irish Constitution.

At this point, Dr Pullicino Orlando recounted what happened in the PN executive two days before the opposition presented its parliamentary motion.

He declared that although it was not easy, he would vote in favour of the opposition’s motion because he was convinced that one should go for a referendum on the matter giving a choice to the electorate. He assured everyone that the opposition’s motion reflected the salient points of the Private Member’s Bill.

Although both the Las Vegas and Irish legislations were no-fault divorce, there was a big difference between the two. Maltese law recognised divorce from Ireland but not from Las Vegas.

He was a politician and a Catholic and had militated in his party since the church schools’ issue. However, it was wrong to put the Church temporal interest first which was given particular strength in the 1995 State-Church concordat. This should not have been done, asserted Dr Pullicino Orlando, adding that Parliament should put people’s interests first.

On the question of fault, it was futile to introduce the fault concept in the divorce process because this would have already been determined in the legal separation process. The concept of no-fault legal separation did not exist in Maltese law.

The Family Court permitted the judge to grant separation even if one of the spouses opposed it, implying also that such judge could grant a no-fault separation. Couples who were de facto separated had to pass through the concept of fault in the divorce process.

The condition that one could apply for divorce at least after four years gave the couple ample time for reconciliation. The Bill envisaged reconciliation and mediation. This was also reflected under separation law. The condition of adequate maintenance, he said, was guaranteed under current law. There were also legal remedies in the civil court on how maintenance money had to be given.

Dr Pullicino Orlando declared that the Bill and the motion presented a no-fault divorce which decreased family conflict, which caused most psychological stress on children irrespective of whether the couple separated, divorced or had their marriage annulled. The Bill even proposed protection to children also when they reached adulthood which was not contemplated under present law.

The question was valid and gave a clear perspective of what the Bill proposed. It gave more value to the family. He asked what value was there in the case of a couple who had been estranged for a number of years.

Cohabitation was no solution because the bond was fragile. There were some who had obtained annulment through legal manoeuvring.

A study conducted by the Church institution Discern envisaged that 35,000 Maltese would have experienced marriage break up by 2015.

Injustice had been perpetuated in the past with the excuse of the common good. The same concept was being used by some opposing the introduction of responsible divorce. Some arguments made in Parliament perpetuated a caste system by bringing about different social strata. How could one argue that refusing minorities a fundamental civil right of marriage could be seen as servicing the common good?

There are persons who felt ostracised and marginalised. Those speakers who had rebuked others expressing themselves in favour of divorce as only trying to find their status in society only produced vain arguments.

He appealed to the Members of the House not to think in terms of the 1975 concordat between state and Church which gave the Church predominance over the State and ignored human empathy. It was an acute injustice for Malta not to permit divorce.

Dr Pullicino Orlando stated that he found himself in an awkward position to vote with the opposition and at the same time worried when considering how the PN accepted pro-divorce candidates to enlist with the party and then came out against divorce.

He could not understand how this party could take this step.

The party spoke on Xogħol, Ġustizzja u Libertà. But was freedom restricted to buying chocolate and toothpaste? Should anyone impose and limit freedom individuals sought for their own happi­­ness? He noted that the PN believed in the family and questioned whether this applied only to those who were married and not recognising the family established out of cohabitation or that following a marital breakdown.

For more than 30 years, to him, the PN signified liberty, family and solidarity and like thousands of other Nationalists he considered the motto of religio et patria used by PN members as reminiscent of colonialism and a thing of the past.

It was important to continue to defend the Church in its work in the community but it was not acceptable for the PN to use religion to impose systems that ran counter to the citizen’s interests.

Last year there was a rise of 12 per cent in Church marriages which Cana Movement director Fr Joseph Mizzi attributed to the campaign undertaken by the movement.

However, a holistic consideration of statistics was to be undertaken. Eurostat and NSO statistics indicated that in 2008 the rate of marriage was that of 6.03 of every 1,000 citizens – a rate which was very high when compared to other EU states. However, statistics also showed that the rate of marital breakdown was 22.2 per cent – a rate that would go up to at least 30 per cent when one considered also the number of annulments.

In light of this, he criticised those who said it was not yet time for Malta to introduce divorce and challenged them to say when they would consider as the right time.

Would they say it was time when the rate of marital breakdown had shot up to 50 per cent and more than half the population would have been forced to cohabit rather than re-marry?

Dr Pullicino Orlando criticised Parliamentary Secretary Jason Azzopardi’s argument that a divorce law would bring about a pro-divorce mentality. He said that after the introduction of divorce in Ireland the rate of marital breakdown was 15 per cent, a rate which was smaller than that in Malta. It was better for the state to prepare persons entering marriage than to frighten people with assumptions that a pro-divorce mentality would prevail with the introduction of a divorce law.

In 2009, a third of children in Malta were born out of wedlock. How many of these had that status because their parents were forced to cohabit rather than remarry. This lead to an untenable situation where mothers registered children as having father unknown to be able to guarantee maintenance through the social welfare system.

He challenged the argument brought forward by some speakers who had argued that the government did not have a mandate to legislate for divorce, when then, the PN government spoke of a cohabitation law even if it was never mentioned it in its electoral programme and only on the basis that it had been mentioned by the President in his address to Parliament. This he said was simply too ambiguous for a basis.

Dr Pullicino Orlando pitied those who “had been called” to form a front to resist divorce, such as Dr André Camilleri who objected to divorce even when a wife was battered by her husband. Could Malta continue to have the legal vacuum of cohabitation? Did Dr Camilleri want women to be punching bags?

Pierre Cordina had said that if divorce was introduced, he could end up considering leaving his wife. What values were these? He knew the Cordinas and knew this was not the case but it was time for people to be careful of what they said. The priority was the people who were suffering.

Some were even raising the issue of abortion and linking it to the introduction of divorce. That was shameful as much as it was untrue, and he had worked actively against the introduction of abortion.

He also criticised Stephen Spiteri for saying that the question was too complicated for the Maltese to understand, and said that it was unacceptable for a member of the House to have such a low opinion of the Maltese and to think of them as imbeciles.

He warned against a yes and no question saying this would give a future legislator the possibility to provide for a softer divorce law. It was only a yes vote to the question as proposed that ensured that a future legislator would not introduce a frivolous divorce.

Dr Pullicino Orlando declared that he would vote no to a yes/no question as he did not want to be an accomplice in the introduction of a quick-fix divorce.

It was worrying for Members of Parliament to say that they would not be bound to follow the result of the referendum simply because it was only consultative in nature. He said that he could not accept the position of an elected member not to accept the people’s will.

Former Leader of the Opposition Alfred Sant had been heavily attacked by the PN as being anti-democratic when he had said he would not follow the referendum vote on the EU membership. Is this not the same argument being made by the Prime Minister on the divorce referendum? If one truly believed in social justice and marriage, then the way forward was in providing for a responsible divorce, Dr Pullicino Orlando said.

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