Parliament may have failed to draft a single opinion on the 170 documents sent by the European Commission last year but this does not mean they were not scrutinised, according to the chairman of the Foreign And EU Affairs Committee.

Francis Zammit Dimech defended Parliament’s track record, insisting that some 161 legislative and non-legislative proposals were scrutinised last year, including the government’s own reactions.

“The committee has scrutinised EU proposals but drafting reasoned opinions is not an obligation,” he said.

Earlier this year, he added, the committee drafted a reasoned opinion on the proposed directive for a common tax base because MPs felt it directly impacted the subsidiary principle where certain decisions were best taken by the individual member states.

“We gave a detailed opinion with the help of EU legal experts. But the fact that in 2010 we did not give a reasoned opinion means there was no situation which we felt needed such a course of action,” Dr Zammit Dimech said. Last week a report published by the European Commission on political dialogue with national parliaments showed that Malta’s Parliament failed to draft a single opinion on the 170 different documents sent by Brussels last year, including more than 80 legislative proposals.

But Dr Zammit Dimech noted that Parliament, like those of other member states, had to undergo a capacity building exercise to be able to absorb the new responsibilities imposed by the Lisbon Treaty. “We needed additional human resources and about a month ago we concluded the exercise to engage two research analysts,” Dr Zammit Dimech said.

He said the committee, which worked on a consensus basis, would continue to scrutinise EU proposals and draft reasoned opinions as “the need arises”.There are 40 national parliamentary chambers in the 27 member states and last year they submitted a total of 387 opinions.