Finance Minister apologises, refunds advert money after Standards Commissioner finds ethical breach

Finance Minister Clyde Caruana was found guilty of an ethical breach by the Standards Commissioner after his ministry ignored government advertising guidelines last year.

Standards Commissioner Joseph Azzopardi found that a finance ministry sponsored Facebook post that advertised energy subsidies with Caruana’s photo breached advertising guidelines set by former standards commissioner George Hyzler.

The advert contained a photo of Caruana alongside a quote by the minister and cost €83.90 excluding VAT.

The minister insisted the post was of public interest and justified his photo because the budget is “intrinsically tied” to the finance minister.

The breach of ethics complaint was filed by Arnold Cassola in October last year. He accused the minister of ignoring the guidelines set by the standards watchdog.

Cassola published the Standards Commissioner report on Friday, which as per procedure, was relayed to him as the complainant.

However, while Azzopardi found that Caruana did breach ethical standards, he did not deem the case to be grave, given the amount of money spent, and suggested the minister apologise and commit himself not to repeat the mistake again.

Caruana duly complied and apologised but also refunded out of his pocket the €83.90 and VAT spent out of public funds for the advert.

In view of Caruana’s apology, the Standards Commissioner considered the case closed.

Government advertising guidelines were drawn up by Hyzler in August 2021 following two cases in which he found that ministerial adverts costing thousands of euros were personal promotions for the ministers involved.

However, subsequent to his findings, the parliamentary committee that discusses what sanctions should be applied ended up in a tie and the Speaker abstained, saying that it was unfair to apply any sanctions in the absence of guidelines.