Transport Minister Austin Gatt told Parliament yesterday that while road planning could be described as good, construction management could be better.

He was answering a supplementary parliamentary question by Labour MP Alfred Sant, who had asked how the planning was being done resulting in simultaneous mass congestion in both northern Malta and Gozo. Why were road projects taking so long to finish?

Dr Gatt said that with EU funds for the “Ten-T” road network being available for a definite period and Mepa permits having to be waited on, Transport Malta did not have much choice on which roads to take in hand and when. Ultimately there was no sense in missing the EU financing period and having to wait for another one.

Dr Gatt said road construction projects in Malta had never attracted foreign tenders, and there were not more than five local contractors with anything near the right manpower and equipment. Sometimes one contractor won two tenders at the same time, but then did not have the equipment or manpower for both.

Acquiring more sophisticated equipment did not make sense for contractors because the current pace of road construction could not be sustained for long; this would make the equipment economically non-viable.

Dr Sant said the minister’s words constituted a defence of chronic inefficiency. He suggested that road construction in northern Malta and Gozo should be planned in alternate periods. It made no sense for Dr Gatt to keep saying that getting more sophisticated equipment wasnot worthwhile.

With question time running out, Dr Gatt retaliated by saying Dr Sant was in a “good” position to speak with the record of notorious bad workmanship in the Marsascala Bypass and the Buġibba project, both done under Labour administrations.