The Planning Authority approved 276 demolitions within Urban Conservation Areas in 2016, nearly a quarter of all such applications approved in development zones last year.

Data tabled in Parliament on Monday also shows that this year the PA approved twice as many UCA applications – 236 – in the month before the general election, May, as it had the previous month.

In all, 1,705 UCA applications (not all of which included demolition) were approved this year. After May, the busiest month was September, with 207 approved applications.

The spike in UCA developments approved before the election corresponds with similar trends reported in other applications, including outside development zones.

Planning Minister Ian Borg provided the figures in response to a question by Partit Demokratiku MP Godfrey Farrugia.

Speaking to the Times of Malta, Dr Farrugia said the PA was failing to protect areas of architectural importance, with even protected UCA ‘enclaves’, often private gardens in old village centres, gradually being built up.

“Village cores are an important part of our heritage. It is not just individual buildings that need to be protected but the streetscape and skyscape as well,” he said, adding that apart from developments within UCAs, new rules allowing taller builders just outside the area had led to the old centres being “buried”.

Flimkien Għal Ambjent environment officer Tara Cassar said the figures were “unsurprising”, highlighting cases where buildings in a good state of repair and designed in the characteristic local style were demolished to make room for five- or six-storey apartment blocks.

“We’re now even seeing this destruction wrought on scheduled properties,” she said, pointing to examples in Sliema, St Julian’s, Ħamrun, Pietà and Msida, as well as the recent controversial demolition of two vernacular townhouses in the heart of Żebbuġ, Gozo.

“Even though these properties contributed to the characteristic and historical appeal of this village, even though they are the exact type of properties which policies should be protecting, the Superintendence approved their demolition,” Ms Cassar said.

“Such decisions are unacceptable especially when these properties, once valued as major contributors to our national identity, have now become open game available for potential development.

“A lack of consistency from the Superintendence and increasing laxness from the PA has resulted in the country being let down too many times. Our cultural and architectural heritage and identity is being obliterated.”