Transport Malta and the General Workers Union are blaming a private contractor and the theft of wiring for a long delay that is preventing the transport authority from transferring its offices to a new building in Marsa.

TM will be paying nearly €500,000 a year for the next five years to occupy the new offices owned by the GWU at the A3 tower in Marsa.

A contract signed between the two parties last year stipulated that the offices had to be handed over by September 2014 and that daily fines would be imposed for any delay.

However, refurbishment works being done by a private contractor have still not been completed and TM has not yet made the move.

Asked to explain the delay, and whether this was in breach of the contract, a spokesman for the transport authority blamed burglars: all the wiring had been stolen from the new offices and it was now having to be re-done, he said.

The GWU gave the same explanation but blamed the contractor for the incident and made it clear it would not be paying any penalties for the delay.

“The handover of the premises was intended to take place nine months from the issue of the Mepa development permit covering the intended use of the offices,” a GWU spokesman said. “The current delay in the handover of the premises is not attributable to the GWU and so no penalties from our side are due.”

Both the GWU and Transport Malta have refused to name the contractor or to say whether a police report has been filed over the claimed burglary.

According to the union, the premises should now be handed over to the GWU by the end of the year. The leasing of GWU property to Transport Malta was the second concluded by the union last year. Part of its headquarters in Valletta is leased to the government’s ARMS Ltd for €62,000 a year.

The Auditor General found that the latter deal was “irregular” and suggested that legal procedures be started against the GWU.

The Attorney General is still to decide on what action to take.