[Watch] ‘No more ruthless wardens’ - Herrera

Jose Herrera - local enforcement reform

The envisaged white paper on the local enforcement system intends on giving wardens the necessary tools and skills to act as a “deterrent” to contraventions and not issue “ruthless” citations, parliamentary secretary for local governance Jose Herrera announced yesterday.

Addressing a public consultation meeting at Floriana, Herrera underlined that wardens should no longer “pounce” on the unsuspecting public and issue fines, but instead should act as the public’s “friend.”

“Wardens should not be arrogant or ruthless when issuing the citations, but conversely, citations should only be issued at a last resort and after the warden sought to deter the contravention from occurring,” Herrera argued while calling on wardens to start differentiating between first-time and repeat offenders.

14 years after it was first introduced, Malta’s local warden system is earmarked for a complete overhaul aimed at implementing greater education and training and also seeks to reduce costs by 20%.

Herrera, the government’s main sponsor of the envisaged reform, insisted that wardens must prioritise “education over sanctioning” - a stand echoed by the South and Xlokk Regional committees which insisted that the system can no longer be profit-driven.

Nevertheless, Herrera insisted that this would not lead to road indiscipline.

Amongst its proposed measures, the white paper envisages that local wardens be no longer employed by private companies, and instead employed by a centralised unit. The unit would enforce laws delegated to the five regional committees, effectively meaning that it would transfer the administration of local wardens from the private company to an “independent” unit.