‘Safety last’ in fireworks policy

The Malta Environment and Planning Authority this week launched a policy framework document to regulate new fireworks factory complexes and to upgrade existing facilities.

Given the sheer preponderance of fatal accidents associated with this activity in recent years, this development is clearly long overdue. Statistical evidence points strongly towards a deterioration in safety standards regarding fireworks: there were six deaths connected with pyrotechnics in 2007 alone, more than the entire preceding decade.

All involved accidents during the manufacture and preparation phases, rather than during actual fireworks displays. This in turn suggests a laxity in regulation governing existing fireworks factories.

From this perspective, one expected any proposed regulation to focus on improving safety standards and minimising the risk of future accidents. At a glance, however, the proposed policy leans heavily towards the creation of new facilities, with only vague and scant measures to increase safety of existing ones.

This even seems to be the declared aim of the chairman of the policy board, Labour MP Michael Falzon.

"The drafting of the policy was driven by the fact that no policies existed which regulated the construction of new fireworks factory complexes," he said, "But it was also driven by the urge to avoid having fireworks enthusiasts going underground."

Both arguments are questionable: as is arguably the choice of Falzon himself - legal representative of the Malta Pyrotechnics Association - to head the discussion.

Part of the problem is that the document itself cites a 2010 report, commissioned by the previous administration following the 2007 fatalities, which had highlighted the need for more factories. But the 2010 report also contradicts the earlier North West Local Plan and the Gozo and Comino local plans, which place severe restrictions on new factories (and, unlike the commission report, these local plans are legally binding).

Effectively, therefore, the new policy will be enacting a non-legal proposal at the expense of existing laws: ignoring the fact that the primary purpose of these laws is to protect the community, and not to facilitate matters for fireworks enthusiasts.

And while it is demonstrably true that unsafe, unregulated operations are a cause of accidents - one example involved a devastating explosion at the heart of densely populated Naxxar, leaving one woman dead and levelling four homes - it remains a fact that the vast majority of explosions have taken place in fully-licensed fireworks factories. Clearly, one cannot lay the blame for Malta's high fireworks fatality rate solely at the door of unlicensed, 'underground' operators.

Moreover, it is in the nature of unlicensed operations to be carried out by unqualified enthusiasts who wouldn't be allowed to work within a legitimate facility anyway. How, therefore, can the risk such persons pose be addressed merely by building more fireworks factories?

Another contentious area concerns the protection of the environment. For reasons of safety one can understand the decision to site new factories exclusively outside development zones. But existing factories which are already well within these zones - and which in some cases pose a clear danger to nearby residents - will be permitted to remain, pending an 'upgrade'.

Surely, given the sensitivity of land-use issues in such a small country, it would make more sense to allow the construction of new 'safe' facilities to replace existing unsafe ones. Yet the policy proposes only adding to the total, without subtracting anything at all.

Even the proposed safety measures seem insufficient. One notes, for instance, that the policy precludes areas of ecological or archaeological interest... but no such restriction seem to exist for agricultural land. Leaving aside the known risks of chemical residue contaminating the soil, this apparent loophole may encourage farmers to redevelop existing structures as fireworks factories (as has happened previously in the case of 'stables' metamorphosing into country villas).

Nor is there mention of the buffer zones surrounding identified areas of conservation... despite the fact that such zones are considered as an important component of scheduling, since any activities on these sites may have an indirect impact on the scheduled areas.

But perhaps the most unsightly proposal concerns the creation of an 'ad hoc committee' to screen fresh applications before these are reviewed by the planning authority itself. This is a nonsensical proposal from every angle. MEPA already possesses the necessary expertise and legislative instruments to evaluate fireworks factory applications. A separate committee would be tantamount to interference in its operations, of the kind that would be patently unacceptable in the context of any other form of development (one wonders how environmentalists would react, if large-scale construction projects were to be screened by an 'ad hoc committee' involving representatives of the construction sector itself).

In practice, there is a palpable danger that this committee will serve  to apply pressure on MEPA to 'sanction' decisions already taken by a government-appointed body. One is forcefully reminded of why - by Falzon's own admission - so little has been done in the past to regulate an activity which is viewed by political parties as a possible vote-swinger.

Once again, too much thought was given to appeasing the fireworks lobby, and not enough to the legitimate safety concerns of the wider public. This is disappointing, though not exactly surprising.