One in three phone calls made to Malta's official emergency number remains unanswered, The Sunday Times has learnt.
This means that every year more than 310,000 calls to the 112 emergency line operated by the Maltese police fails to be picked up. Other EU countries have an unanswered percentage rate of between zero and 6.5 per cent.
Sources said European Commission officials were recently in Malta to try to understand why the system was so poor, but police have denied being "directly approached".
The police blamed Malta's poor record on blocked lines caused by prank callers or those who called when there was no genuine emergency. They added that some people did not allow enough time for their calls to be answered.
However, sources said the reasons for the poor response rate were more likely due to a lack of resources, mismanagement of the system or misuse of the system in that it may be being used for internal calls by police.
The control room, which is manned by a minimum of three police officers at any given moment, receives almost two calls per minute of the day, which means it is practically impossible that they are all emergency calls, particularly as only 17 per cent of the population are aware of the 112 emergency number, sources said.
The authorities have not yet forwarded the unanswered calls rate to the European Commission, even though they were asked to do so some months ago.
Although the police provided The Sunday Times with figures relating to the number of unanswered calls, these did not feature in a report drawn up by the EC which examined the implementation of the European-wide service in all EU states.
The only statistic mentioned in what is known as the Cocom report, is that Maltese operators take approximately one hour to trace where the calls originated from - and that is only within office hours.
Most other EU countries do this immediately or within a couple of minutes.
According to the police, a task force has been set up to improve the service, and in July it drew up a comprehensive report highlighting what needed to be done.
The police said there are three consoles in their control room and all calls are handled by policemen who are trained in call-handling and dealing with emergency calls.
The police also said that, depending on the nature of the emergency, callers were either directed to the Civil Protection Department or to Mater Dei Hospital, unless more information is required from the caller.
Sources said this was an inappropriate policy since emergency callers should be kept on the line at all times while operators should dispatch help through another line.
The police also pointed out that because of the way the system was structured, unanswered calls were directed at once to the Civil Protection Department or the hospital.
A spokesman for the European Commission told The Sunday Times it was following 112's implementation "very closely" as it does in all EU states, but added that in Malta, there was no infringement and no public complaints had been received.
Emergency 112 in numbers
• Telephone consoles: Three
• Phone operators: Minimum of three
• Total calls every six months: 456,000
• Percentage of unanswered calls: January to June 2008: 33.2%
• Percentage of unanswered calls: January to March 2009: 33.7%
• Total calls received in 2008: 932,253
• Approximate number of unanswered calls in 2008: 310,751
• Percentage of Maltese who know the purpose of 112: 17%