New regulations on billboards issued recently by the government did no revoke the old ones, PN lawyer Karol Aquilina told a court today.

He made his argument as a court continued to hear a PN application requesting the court to stop the government from removing its billboards.

The party's request for a warrant of prohibitory injunction was provisionally upheld earlier this month until the court definitively decides the case.

The new regulations were issued by legal notice on March 29. They limit political billboards, free of licence fees, to three months before an election.

Should the parties wish to put up billboards outside that time span they would have to pay an annual licence fee of €1,500 per billboard to Transport Malta.

Dr Aquilina pointed out that the new legal notice does not revoke the old one, as is the norm.

Planning Authority lawyer Robert Abela hit back at this point, saying that if the old law was still in place then the PN should have based its injunction on it and not the new law.

PN secretary general Rosette Thake told the court that the PN had spent €40,000 on putting up these billboards and the new legal notice would cost it a further €30,000 annually.

Ms Thake said the billboards were used to advertise political activities and get the Opposition's political message across in order to hold the government to account.

She said that contrary to the Labour Party the PN had taken down all its billboards after the 2013 general election. The PL had kept them up and used them for commercial purposes and these same billboards had sometimes also been used by the government, Ms Thake said.

She pointed out that the PN had only put up its billboards last month in light of the Panama Papers scandal.

PN lawyer Jason Azzopardi said the government had effectively imposed a tax of €30,000 on the Opposition, "coincidentally" been introduced during the Panama Papers scandal.

Dr Aquilina said the new legal notice effectively made it impossible for the party to keep its billboards in place.

Dr Abel said the publication of the legal notice was no “coincidence”. Discussions on the new legal notice began in 2014, he said.

Everyone knew the current situation about billboards in Malta, therefore the need to introduce licensing of these billboards was felt, Dr Abela said. 

He said the legal notice aimeds to “rein in the current anarchy”.

Dr Abela said the previous system of imposing daily fines on illegal billboards was not working. Many times the commercial gains from the billboard outweighed the fines, and establishing the ownership of the billboard was not always possible.

The Planning Authority lawyer argued that the previous law did not allow for year-round political billboards, but only permitted the advertising of political other religious activities for a maximum of 28 days.

Regulating billboards in no way stifled the Opposition's freedom of expression, Dr Abela said.

Madam Justice Jacqueline Padovani Grima said a court decree will be handed down by May 10.