A €1 million fund will be dedicated to big projects driven by local councils, Justice Minister Owen Bonnici announced yesterday.

The projects will be chosen by a selection board within the Justice Ministry and preference given to those that are sustainable and generate a return to be pumped back into the fund, he said.

The new scheme could give renewed hope to councils with big plans, such as Mellieħa.

It is now important to encourage councils to plan ahead and think creatively. The time for amateurism is over

Its mayor, John Buttigieg, has said he dreams of a cable car that would carry passengers from Mellieħa centre to Għadira Bay – but such a project would depend on funds that have so far been unavailable.

Yesterday, Dr Bonnici said local councils had until the end of the month to submit their proposals for capital projects. They are encouraged to include detailed plans on funding, possibly a mix of private and government money.

The amount granted to individual projects would not be capped but there would not be a situation where all the money would go to one project, he said.

For years, he added, local councils had not been able to carry out large projects and this was mainly because of the inefficient way in which funds were allocated.

This was often criticised by the Auditor General, Dr Bonnici said, noting that the Labour government had inherited a local council system with €22 million in debt because of the inefficient systems used by the Nationalist government.

In his annual local councils report for 2013, Auditor General Anthony Mifsud observed that, in spite of repeated warnings and recommendations to rectify serious financial shortcomings in the daily running of local governments, the issues flagged years ­­­ago persisted. There were cases in which expenditure had exceeded the budget and procurement was not done in line with the pertinent regulations, he said.

Yesterday, Parliamentary Secretary for innovation Stefan Buontempo said the government believed in efficient local councils that were close to the people.

It was now important to encourage councils to plan ahead and think creatively and sustainably.

“The time for amateurism is over,” he said.

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