Vacant properties lacking a compliance certificate due to “minor irregularities” could soon be on the market as the Government is considering granting a one-time concession to regularise them.
The Parliamentary Secretary for Planning, Michael Farrugia, told a conference on the planning authority reform yesterday this could be one of the solutions to put some of the estimated 70,000 vacant properties back on the market.
Dr Farrugia told Times of Malta a scheme launched by the previous Administration to regularise buildings not in line with the sanitary laws had failed.
The scheme was meant for properties with internal yards and backyards smaller than the minimum allowed by law, but Dr Farrugia said it was riddled with bureaucracy.
“We are trying to address minor irregularities that kept property out of the market for up to 40 years,” he said, stressing that the planned concession would not apply to buildings outside development zones.
“We will not be solving everyone’s problems,” he noted, adding that if the scheme could help put vacant property back on the market it would be a success.
We will not be solving everyone’s problems
Dr Farrugia told the conference the Government believed it was better to opt for high-rise building rather than to take up more virgin land.
Asked whether this meant the Government was giving in to the development lobby, which wants more high-rise buildings, Dr Farrugia insisted it was not the case.
“I am sticking to my guns that for every additional floor there must be an open space with the equivalent footprint rather than half, as the developers are insisting,” he said.
Dr Farrugia announced that the Malta Environmental and Planning Authority had started an exercise to photograph all building facades. He said this ambitious project would facilitate enforcement because monitoring the situation through aerial photography was not enough.
He dismissed concerns that such an exercise would invade people’s privacy. “Mepa is already in possession of the internal layout of all buildings and so I see no data protection issues in taking photographs of facades,” Dr Farrugia said.
He said the decision to reduce Mepa tariffs had not led to a shortfall in revenue as some had predicted because there was a rise in the number of development applications, especially for offices.
Touching on the revision of local plans, he said the Government would be identifying some industrial areas that could be included in the current schemes.
Areas “already committed”, such as those where a number of garages were in operation, would be favourably considered.
Both Dr Farrugia and Mepa chairman Vince Cassar commented on the fact that building designs in recent years left much to be desired and many “box-like structures” were built.
Environmental NGO Flimkien għal Ambjent Aħjar said the conference highlighted the importance the public was giving to environmental issues and the quality of life in urban areas.
It expressed concern that Mepa’s focus was on development regulations and the legalisation of abuse, with no talk of the effect of overdevelopment.