Councillors considering ways to help refugee families

A number of councillors are presently analysing ways by which they can help dispersed Syrian refugee families.

The move follows a proposal by Birzebbugia councillor Hermann Schiavone who suggested his local council should “adopt and finance a Syrian family”.

Alternattiva Demokratika councillors Michael Briguglio and Ralph Cassar immediately voiced their support and are discussing how the proposal could be implemented.

Because the law prohibits local councils from making donations and aiding NGOs, the councils must find alternative ways to help. The idea, still in its infancy, is to bring together Maltese communities with each locality financially supporting a refugee family for a year.

Schiavone is currently in talks with “a legal expert” to see how the idea can be implemented within the legal parameters. He wasn’t suggesting that local councils carry the financial burdens, he added.

“As a local council we can hold activities to support one family for a year,” Schiavone said, adding that helping families out didn’t mean placing them on social services.

“The Maltese are known to always rise up to the occasion when their help is needed and as a nation we can send a strong message of solidarity in practice,” he said.

The PN councillor said he had received both positive and negative feedback. He also had families calling to check whether they could adopt or foster children from Syria. “Obviously I am not the right person to go to on this matter but it shows that the Maltese are ready to help.”

Alan Abela-Wadge, president of the PN college of councillors (KKLPN), said the college positively noted Schiavone’s proposal.

“Undoubtedly, this proposal has been welcomed by a number of other councillors coming from different political parties and different localities, and in fact it has reportedly also been proposed in other localities,” Abela-Wadge told MaltaToday.

“As we speak, KKLPN is brainstorming the best ways to move forward with this proposal, ensuring that any such proposal is fully in line with the law. KKLPN further notes with satisfaction that it was one of its members who initiated a discussion on how even at a local level, the Maltese people can proactively respond to this human tragedy.”

Mario Fava, head of the Labour Party’s councillors section, said there was nothing wrong if local councils supported fund-raising activities to help refugee families.

“It is however not the local council’s remit to ‘adopt’ families, nor is it legally permissible,” Fava told MaltaToday.

In the UK, Labour leadership candidate Yvette Cooper called on Britain’s towns and cities to take in 10,000 refugees a year. Forty councils in the UK have so far responded to her call.
“If every city took 10 refugee families, if every London borough took 10 families, if every county council took 10 families, if Scotland, Wales and every English region played their part, then in a month we’d have nearly 10,000 more places for vulnerable refugees fleeing danger, seeking safety,” Cooper told a conference in London.
Meanwhile, Finnish Prime Minister Juha Sipila on Saturday offered to host refugees at his country home.

According to AFP, Sipila said the house – situated over 500 kilometres north of the capital Helsinki, in the Kempele area – was “not being used much at the moment”.

“I hope this becomes some kind of people’s movement that will inspire many others to shoulder part of the burden in this refugee housing crisis,” he said.