The Church Environment Commission (KA) this morning reiterated its call for a national study on property.

In a position paper, it said such a study would go beyond interests pertaining to a particular section of Maltese society and would take into account every aspect related to quality of life.

The commission acknowledged the benefits of a study on property development commissioned by the Malta Developers Association but stressed that the government and the competent authorities, including the Planning Authority, should still take the initiative and launch their own study, as they were duty bound to do.

The commission first called for such a study following the publication of Pope Francis’ Laudato Si in a set of proposals to the local civil and ecclesiastical authorities.

It reiteratediterated its appeal in communication with the government before the presentation of the 2017 Budget and in other instances.

It said today: “The KA is somewhat surprised that just a few weeks after the president of the Malta Developers’ Association (MDA) declared on a radio talk show that there was no need for such study, the MDA is now commissioning a study that will tackle some of the aspects that the KA thinks should feature in a similar study.” 

The commission said that the fact that the study, by KPMG, was being carried out was a positive move since it would be folly to take rash decisions on crucial issues given the country’s limited space.

“While a contractor or developer is free to risk his financial capital in any way he pleases, our country cannot continue to put up with building projects which have been declared as failures by whoever was responsible for them.” 

But this study, the KA insisted, should have been commissioned by the government itself through the relative competent authorities. 

Since the study’s promoter was from the private sector, one risked ending in a situation where the inferences drawn from the results would not be holistic enough to allow for the right decisions to be taken on a national level, both by the government and by the planning authority, simply because it would be satisfying the remit of the body commissioning it.

This, the KA said, was implied in the inaugural speech by the MDA president when he stated that the association wished to carry out this study to substantiate its long-held belief and also that it would be examining the outcome so that policies put forward and the MDA’s proposals would have greater credibility and the Prime Minister would be more comfortable understanding why certain policies were being proposed.

“The feeling that one is already aware of what the results of a study will show before the completion of such study, does not augur well."

"For this reason, it is important that the interpretation of the results be carried out in an objective way and without any prejudice whatsoever. Otherwise, it would be useless to carry out the study in a scientific and scrupulous manner,” it said.

The opinion paper in full can be read in the pdf link below.

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