Grech: Women at risk with domestic violence sittings’ backlog stretching into 2025

Opposition leader Bernard Grech tore into the government’s lax law enforcement efforts to quell Malta’s domestic violence problem, using a court prosecution scheduled to 2025 as an example.

Grech showed his audience in Isla at the PN club, a court summons for 2025 on a domestic violence report filed this year.

He said the summons had been sent to him by the concerned family, saying the woman was at risk right up to the slated date, because no court action was possible up until then.

Grech accused the Labour administration of being spendthrift on its publicity campaigns, rather than focusing much-needed resources into law enforcement and judicial means that can hasten domestic violence prosecutions.

“Understand: you have a social responsibility to address these problems today, rather than spending our cash on publicity campaigns. You cannot leave people on their own! You cannot abandon your responsibilities towards citizens!”

Grech said it was the judiciary itself that had publicly come out to complain that it was being left without the necessary resources allowing them achieve a more efficient judicial process. “It is indeed the government to blame when the judiciary complains that there is not enough money to build the necessary resources required to streamlining the judicial system.”

Grech segued into the PN’s calls for a ‘model of excellence’ for Malta’s new economic development, calling for greater social and environmental investment, while also warning that population pressures would keep affecting quality of life. “We need a population that is proud of its identity, of its national heritage, that keeps investing in our future generations, and that creates the future you deserve so much.”