The Commission for People with Disability is looking for safer and more accessible premises, as it plans to move out of the building in Santa Venera it has used for nearly 30 years.
“When I was appointed head of the commission, I realised that the building from which we operate is inadequate for the staff and the clients,” Oliver Scicluna told this newspaper yesterday, when a stone slab fell from the façade of the building on Braille Street – right next to where he parks his own car.
Mr Scicluna was contacted after a reader sent photos of the fallen stone slab, concerned at the danger that the building posed to those who dropped by at KNPD’s offices.
The man was told that this was not the first incident of the sort, and was warned about another parking spot nearby where other stone slabs had fallen off the façade. He urged the authorities to take action before a tragedy took place.
The building poses other challenges: whenever there is a power cut at the current offices, wheelchair users have to be lifted down two storeys. Hazards at the offices include loose tiles, which often trip up passers-by.
The KNPD and other government departments are hosted at the Bugeja Institute on Braille Street, which was built in the beginning of the 20th century and has served as a hospital among other things.
The KNPD asked for three impact assessments, which include health and safety, to be carried out on the premises, and the results were handed to the government earlier this year.
Mr Scicluna explained that the commission was looking for a ground floor building so that employees and clients who use a wheelchair would not have to rely on the lift.
The Commissioner said that the tender for new premises should be out in the next two months, and the KNPD was looking to rent offices that are centrally located and have parking facilities.
Moving out of a building hosting government departments and into its own premises would also strengthen the concept of the commission’s new role as regulator.
The KNPD, which is being renamed Commission for the Rights of People with Disability, will be able to focus more on its role as a regulator as it transfers its service provision obligations to Aġenzija Sapport.