I refer to the letter that appeared in these columns about the licence fee for the use of swimming pools (August 28).
The construction of private swimming pools, if designed professionally, according to a statutory specification controlled by the Malta Environment and Planning Authority, should be encouraged, but not taxed as they are at present, by the imposition of an annual licence fee for use of the pool.
The pool must have a reservoir, either alongside or beneath it, one and a quarter larger in capacity than the pool itself. The reservoir will serve to catch the rain water during the winter season. During summer, this rainwater is pumped into the pool, leaving enough water in the reservoir for replacing pool water that would be lost through evaporation and back-washing during its use in summer. To construct such a pool one would have to pay a one-time levy to Mepa.
Such a pool is a perennial source of revenue to the government, by way of income tax on wages paid to caretakers, and VAT paid on parts and chemicals. In the absence of the said reservoir for reasons acceptable to Mepa, the use of fresh water from boreholes would have to be obtained at a premium, because this is a consumption of a substance extremely vital for the community and very expensive to produce by reverse osmosis, whenever rainfall proves inadequate.
Swimming is a healthy and popular pastime like tennis, gardening, bowling, skittles, billiards etc... None of these activities is a nuisance to neighbours. If one has enough space where to set up the required facilities, and carry out such activities, one should not be taxed to do so. Yet owners of private pools are being taxed for using their pools. The licence fee for use of a private pool restricts the right of enjoying one’s property. An annual licence fee is not required to use part of one’s house as a garden, or/and as a tennis court, or as a bowling alley, or use a room for playing billiards. Hence, why is the Malta Resources Authority discriminating by imposing a licence fee for use of a private swimming pool? This is an injustice!
The primary scope of imposing an annual licence fee to carry out a specific activity is to make it very easy to the authorities concerned to suspend that activity that would not be carried out in compliance with the law, or would have become a nuisance to the public.
A group of private swimming pool owners should jointly challenge in our courts the Swimming Pools (Control) Regulations of 1998, if this injustice is to be addressed the proper way.