The doctors’ union has called for the revocation of a law that allows the normal planning process to be waived for new development taking place on hospital grounds.
While welcoming the decision not to invoke this law in the case of the planned Gozo hospital, the union’s secretary general Martin Balzan said the law should be taken off the statute books.
“The government should withdraw this legal notice so as not to leave any lingering doubts for the future,” he said.
The Medical Association of Malta, he said, would insist that an environmental impact assessment be carried out for this project even if the planning authority was to deem it unnecessary.
“Issues which might impact directly on health and safety should be addressed at planning stage and not later when it could be too late,” he said.
Dr Balzan was asked for his reaction to the announcement made a few days ago by Health Minister Konrad Mizzi, that the legal notice exempting any development within hospital grounds from requiring a full planning permit would not be applied in this case.
This controversial law, published last August on the eve of the feast of Santa Marija, had raised eyebrows due to its timing.
Apart from the waiver, the government also enacted a blanket exemption from an environmental impact study for any kind development within government hospitals, through a separate legal notice published on the same day. The move fuelled fierce criticism, with the government accused of trying to introduce these changes by stealth to accommodate Singaporean firm Vitalis Global Healthcare, which was holding talks to redevelop the former St Luke’s Hospital and the Gozo General Hospital.
Subsequently, it had also emerged that the EIA exemption was not in line with the stringent EU laws, raising concerns that Malta could be on a collision course with Brussels. In turn this prompted the Opposition to file a parliamentary motion intended to repeal these laws.
Speaking at a public dialogue meeting, the Prime Minister yesterday admitted that the public outcry had forced a rethink.
“There are laws and processes that have to be respected. For example we wanted to speed up matters at St Luke’s because of the shortage of beds and made changes to enable this to happen… after receiving criticism we decided to go for a full planning process, which takes its time,” Dr Muscat said in reply to questions.
Meanwhile the Health Ministry would not say whether it would withdraw these legal notices, now that the government had no intention to invoke them.
A ministry spokeswoman noted that, for these laws to take effect, there needed to be a ministerial declaration justifying a specific project.
“No such declarations have been made to date,” the spokeswoman said. “In the absence of such declarations, the development of the Gozo Hospital requires a normal process for planning and environment. This is being pursued.”