In a 10-hour meeting that started at 4 p.m. on Thursday and finished at 2 a.m. yesterday, the House Committee for the Consideration of Bills, under the chairmanship of Deputy Speaker Ċensu Galea, managed to go through 66 per cent of the clauses of the Divorce Bill. The committee had its first meeting, which lasted four hours, on Wednesday – barely three hours after the Bill was given a second reading by an overwhelming majority of 44 votes for, 13 against and 12 abstentions.
The experts would be meeting tomorrow to see to the legal jargon of the clauses so that the Bill would not encounter any problems when it comes up for approval in the House on Monday, July 25 and later, in a separate session a few minutes later, approved in third reading.
It is expected that the amendments to the Civil Code, providing for the introduction of divorce in Malta, would be in place by the beginning of October.
During yesterday’s marathon session it was agreed that no divorce would be granted before the couple would have been separated for four years – one of the conditions the electorate voted on and approved in the referendum – or if alimony had not been paid.
The discussion also focused on the wording of certain clauses, with a lengthy discussion on the Maltese translation of the wording “living apart” for a period of at least four years during the last five years, lifted directly from Irish law.
Mario de Marco (PN) said it would be advisable to use the same wording of the referendum question because that would be the text most loyal to the approved question.
Bill proposers Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando and Evarist Bartolo said that this had to be interpreted also for couples living apart under the same roof and not necessarily in separate residences. Such couples could and should not be excluded.
Legal experts Deborah Schembri, Angele Attard and Attorney General Peter Grech took part in the discussion.
The committee also discussed the provisions for alimony or maintenance. The committee agreed that the spouses, may at any time, renounce to the right of maintenance.
Dr Schembri said a request for unpaid maintenance could be filed with the police. Labour MP Marie Louise Coleiro said certain women found it hard to go to the police because members of the corps were not trained to handle such matters and, moreover, the police stations did not provide for any privacy.
During the discussion Family Minister Dolores Cristina and Ms Coleiro both said that there were cases of separation before the courts where women renounced the right to maintenance without knowing the consequences of such a decision: if anything happened in the future, they would not be entitled to social assistance.
Owen Bonnici (PL) said both parties had agreed that no more notarial deeds on divorce would need to be done as they had agreed on a number of small amendments, that were under the clause providing for succession. Francis Zammit Dimech (PN) said informal discussion would be held with Mr Bartolo and Dr Bonnici, so that clauses would reflect what had been agreed by the two sides.