The Labour Party and its three MEPs have so far failed to publish the accounts and code of ethics that were promised before the last European elections.
The Labour Party ignored several requests by The Sunday Times to provide the code of conduct for MEPs while its representatives in the European Parliament – Louis Grech, John Attard Montalto and Edward Scicluna – refused to provide details of how their offices are using the EU funding at their disposal.
On the other hand, Nationalist MEPs Simon Busuttil and David Casa have published for the first time on their websites audited accounts of their office’s expenses for their first year in the new legislature (until last December) and have promised to repeat the exercise by the end of every calendar year.
The issue of transparency was a hot potato before the last MEP elections with various foreign press reports claiming certain parliamentarians were siphoning into their own pockets EP money provided for the running of their offices in Brussels and their constituencies.
In order to start with a clean slate and provide better transparency, the EP enacted a new statue for its members including granting the same pay for every MEP. Travel expenses started being paid against the presentation of receipts instead of a lump sum payment which used to be paid to MEPs in past legislatures.
Both the PN and the PL had promised more transparency before the June 2009 elections by creating a code of ethics and obliging MEPs to provide more details about the way they spend their EU allowances while in office.
According to details provided to this newspaper, apart from their monthly personal salary of €7,000, the two Nationalist MEPs spent about €22,000 a month on the running of their offices in Malta, Brussels and Strasbourg.
Dr Busuttil and Mr Casa also gave details on how these funds were spent, including the names of employees.
The Transparency Commitment Forms published by Nationalist MEPs show that during the first six months in office, Dr Busuttil spent €8,000 more than Mr Casa.
The major expense for both MEPs was related to staff salaries with Dr Busuttil employing seven full-timers and three part-timers while Mr Casa employed five full-time staff and another four on a part-time basis.
The two MEPs also declared they claimed €23,244 each as subsistence allowance for a total of 78 days spent in Brussels or Strasbourg.
On the other hand, the Labour MEPs have so far refused to furnish details of their expenses.
Asked to provide the code of ethics for its MEPs since last April, the PL spokesman said he did not manage to find the documents although he promised to comply with the request.
Despite various e-mails and reminders, no details on the code of ethics have been forwarded.
Nor have the three Labour MEPs been forthcoming despite various attempts.
In an e-mail sent on behalf of his colleagues last May, Mr Grech had said that “the members of the Maltese delegation will issue their financial statements after the end of the first legislative year (July 2009 – July 2010).”
Reminded last month about the pledge to publish their financial details by July, the three MEPs once again declined to give answers.
The Sunday Times is informed that all three Labour MEPs currently employ foreign staff as their main assistants in Brussels although they also employ a number of local employees in their offices in Malta.
All employees of the two Nationalist MEPs are Maltese.
Before the last European elections, an internal EP report leaked in Brussels unveiled that some MEPs systematically abused parliamentary allowances.
The report showed that the unnamed MEPs involved had claimed for paying assistants of whom no records existed and diverted public money into front companies.