‘Sorry’: The new quality standard

Robert Abela is truly at odds on how to tackle the Clayton Bartolo-Clint Camilleri debacle over a consultancy job given to the former’s wife.

The Prime Minister first defended his ministers and insisted Bartolo’s apology was sufficient, refusing to sack both of them. He later tried to distance himself by shifting the onus of responsibility for any decision on their fate to parliament’s Ethics Committee.

At the same time, the Prime Minister claimed credit for having ‘sacked’ Bartolo’s wife from government employment three years ago. “Perhaps some people didn’t understand the decision at the time. But now I say thank God, I took it when I did,” he told Times of Malta when doorstepped outside parliament.

It seems as if Abela wants us to pat him on the back for the decision he purportedly took back then to terminate Amanda Muscat’s ‘consultancy’ agreement.

The funny thing about the Prime Minister’s latest declaration is that we are only getting to know now about his actions when the story detailing Muscat’s employment saga was first published by The Shift News back in 2022.

Back then, there was no declaration of sorts – not even a whimper by the Prime Minister, or the Office of the Prime Minister. Abela either dealt with the matter quietly not to stir the pot in the hope that the matter slips under the radar; or made no such decision himself.

I guess we will never know the truth as to how Muscat’s employment was terminated because even the Standards Commissioner was left baffled as to how this happened.

But this is a moot point at this stage. The bigger question is, did the ministers act in a correct way? Was it right for Bartolo to give his then-girlfriend an advisory role, which saw her shoot up to Scale 3 of the civil service grades and paid an additional ‘expertise allowance’ of €15,000, when she continued to work as a private secretary? Was it right that Muscat was, on paper, transferred as an advisor with the Gozo Ministry with an even higher allowance to escape scrutiny but still worked for her future-husband at the tourism ministry as a secretary?

Any honest right-thinking person, including tens of thousands of Labour voters, would answer all these questions with a plain “no”.

The only reason Muscat became an advisor with a hefty pay packet was because she was the minister’s girlfriend. This is greed at the taxpayer’s expense and anybody can see it for what it is.

Unfortunately, Bartolo believes that a half-hearted apology is enough while describing calls for his resignation as “spin”. He cannot even begin to comprehend the anger a story like his creates among ordinary people, who work hard to improve their family’s standing, pay all their taxes and try to fulfil their duties in an honest way.

Camilleri, on the other hand, is on a different planet altogether, defending his actions by saying that Muscat’s engagement was according to existing guidelines. He obviously knows that he was used but cannot admit as much in public and is simply making a fool of himself.

The Prime Minister understands this is an issue that will not blow away and in typical fashion is trying to find a way out of the mess to avoid being personally tarnished, while allowing his ministers to be pilloried in public in the hope they will step down of their own accord.

If Abela is serious about upholding quality standards he should have asked his ministers to do the right thing and resign. Our suspicion, based on his behaviour, is that he does not have the moral authority to do so because when the questionable employment happened, he was perfectly fine with it. Who is Abela trying to kid when he self-congratulates himself on something he supposedly did three years ago and told no one about?

Meanwhile, honest, hardworking people will have to console themselves with Bartolo’s “sorry”. It’s the new quality standard, it seems.