Previous government ‘wasted 30% of its EU migration funds’

Ian Borg says that the current government has absorbed 20% more of Malta's EU funds to help it deal with irregular immigration than the previous administation had. 

EU Funds parliamentary secretary Ian Borg
EU Funds parliamentary secretary Ian Borg

The previous Nationalist administration wasted around 30% of the funds that the EU had allocated to Malta to help it deal with irregular migration, EU Funds parliamentary secretary Ian Borg said.

“The previous government had only absorbed 72.8% of the money allocated to it through the Refugee Fund and the External Borders Fund,” Borg said during his parliamentary adjournment. “On the other hand, the current government has absorbed 93.6% of its allocated funds, millions of euro that were used to provide more tools to the police force, provide the Armed Forces with a new helicopter, set up an Advanced Passenger Information System, improve detention centres, provide migrants with accommodation and food. A maritime squadron's building will soon be completed too."

“Let’s say it as it is- the previous administration had the funds to help migrants at their disposal and they left 30% of it go to waste.”

He said that the government will keep pressuring the EU to allocate more funds to Malta to help it deal with irregular immigration, but that the funds won’t stop the government insisting for a solution to stability in the Mediterranean and Libya.

“People will keep on crossing the Mediterranean,” Borg said, recounting Prime Minister Joseph Muscat’s comparison of undocumented migrants to the people who had jumped out of the World Trade Centre Twin Towers on 9/11. “It is Europe’s duty to save these migrants from drowning and to treat them with dignity. Sometimes people need to see the pictures of these migrants swallowing water and drowning to understand the grim reality of the situation.”

Borg said that, as of January 2013, the previous administration had only absorbed 30% of the EU funds allocated for Malta between 2007 and 2013.

“Two years later, it’s up to 78%, and we plan to absorb the remaining 22% before the end of the year,” Borg said. “The rate is so high because this government isn’t afraid of taking decisions.”

He referred to EU-funded projects such as the Youth Guarantee Scheme, the restoration of Fort St Elmo, Fort St Angelo and Cittadella, the Coast Road project and the Oncology Hospital.

“The Opposition likes to describe some of these projects, such as the Coast Road one, as its own brainchild,” Borg said. “However, the fact remains that they had simply stopped at the planning stage.”