On the Dot

• British MEP Paul Nuttall has demanded an inquiry into claims that two Merseyside hospitals passed on confidential patient medical records to the notorious ambulance-chasing lawyers. One hopes this will never occur in Malta. Yet, it is food for thought that, sometimes, insurance companies phone people soon after they would have lost a loved one from whom they could have stood to inherit property or funds.

Development

• Several waiting rooms have a dearth of reading materials, with clients’ or patients’ attention being demanded by blaring television sets tuned to financial or music stations that would not interest the majority of people. Others have tatty magazines with covers or pages missing. Surely, a reading culture is not promoted by these attitudes!

Delightful

• Another way to encourage people to read is to have a library based on an honour system book swap without any registration fees or even forms. People who have books to give away could drop them at a parish centre or somewhere similar and those who need reading material could pick up something for free. If the scheme does not work because all the books are taken and not replaced, no money would have been spent in setting it up.

Delivery

• The good news is that the long-awaited lift will once again rise from the Lascaris ditch to the Upper Barrakka gardens in Valletta. This time around, there will be two passenger cabins that will be able to carry up to 800 people per hour. One hopes the fares will not be high enough to discourage people from using this facility as a short cut and that the system will work on a small profit, quick return basis.

Dogged

• Canine friends will henceforth be forbidden from swimming with their owners in swimmers’ zones because of the possibility that they might spread zoonooses and pollute the water. So, shall we be seeing dogs balancing on thermoform plastic planks being encouraged to jump off and swim once they reach the area outside the floats?

Dud

• One wonders which was the more dud decision, to call a bus stop Ewkaristija or Dud. Given that people tend to pronounce words on signs according to their mother tongue, surely more care ought to have been taken with the selections, after all, motorists are forbidden to select certain combinations for their car number plates.

Deadly

• Despite warnings about them last year, it would seem that a sizeable supply of night lamps and electric insect killers that could be potentially lethal is still available locally. The former have no fuse and the latter work on the principle of a taser gun. Moreover, when the products are given the appearance of toys to make them attractive, children are more likely to become interested in them.

Deteriorating

• With the swimming season well and truly here, many people are once again congregating at Bognor Beach in Buġibba. It is inevitable that some show-offs would seek to use the iron frames near the old boċċi pitch as a climbing frame, to show how fit they are. The whole structure has seen much better days – and this is the probable reason it is not dismantled after the entertainment spot closes down for the summer. It might not be safe to use in a manner for which it was not intended and the rusted metal might even be sharp enough in places to tear skin.

Daring

• The government keeps honing and buffing its arrogance. The green light has been given to certain government employees such that they may have all the parking area in the vicinty of their offices, in the Upper Barrakka area, to themselves. Common mortals are shooed away by a police officer, specifically on duty to this end. This is ridiculous, apart from involving a wasted salary.

Demeaning

• Parking fines and other traffic violation dues may be paid at whichever local council offices one desires. Not so infringements against the Valletta CVA cameras. These have to be paid at the offices of the Valletta local council, thus increasing the probability that you will compound your felony by ending up having to pay another fine.

Disastrous

• Just across the road from the playing field in Fleur-de-Lys Road, as soon as one turns the corner from Fleur-de-Lys Junction, is an unsteady electricity pylon that will probably soon fall across the road, given the vibrations by the roadworks in progress. Moreover, the cables it holds are not properly secured. Some are looped with tape and some hang loose, such that they can even be reached by passers-by.

Dangers

• At the Birkirkara terminus, workers were seen last Monday using a hand drill and related apparatus. Whereas they were wearing fluorescent tabards, they had no other kind of safety gear, such as ear muffs and gloves. If they were not issued, the foreman is to blame. If they were issued and not worn, the workers should be disciplined. Health and safety officers must run checks on public works staff not only on private sites.

Difference

• It is nice to see the “dancing water” at St George’s Square in Valletta. However, after a while, one notices that the water is synchronised to only one classical track, which is relayed over and over again. Surely these days, there is software that would make it possible to include different tempos and genres of music to suit the tastes of all the people enjoying the sight? The music could be played at intervals, as indeed it is now – but at least it would be varied.