Busuttil’s ethics revamp vows to restore trust and honesty in politics

‘Good Governance package’ promises decency over Labour’s ham-fisted rewrite of rulebook

Simon Busuttil in 2014 at a General Council the day Manuel Mallia was facing increasing pressure to resign after his security driver fired two shots at a drunk motorist that nicked the ministerial vehicle.
Simon Busuttil in 2014 at a General Council the day Manuel Mallia was facing increasing pressure to resign after his security driver fired two shots at a drunk motorist that nicked the ministerial vehicle.

A much awaited package of good governance rules proposed by Opposition leader Simon Busuttil is promising to make politics the preserve of honest lawmakers and give voters “a pact based on trust” – and is expected to give Prime Minister Joseph Muscat a run for his money after Labour dented its ethical credentials.

Busuttil will present his document, ‘Restoring Trust in Politics’, today to the party’s general council, with a bid to introduce strict rules for ministers, parliamentary scrutiny of the highest offices of the State and the civil service, and scale back Labour’s largesse, which has seen MPs placed on the state payroll and granted ‘positions of trust’.

Busuttil will tell party councillors today that he wants to restore public trust in politics “by raising the bar” and fight the “lowering of standards” prompted by Labour when it was elected to power in 2013, ironically on a platform of good governance.

“This does not mean the PN is free from blame. In the past, it committed its own mistakes, some of them serious, and paid a heavy electoral price. It is also responsible for having failed to ensure that good governance was sufficiently entrenched in the country as to outlive its own government,” Busuttil says in his introduction.

Busuttil’s 109 proposals to restore trust in politics

The PN leader hits out at Labour’s rapid concentration of power and loss of autonomy for public institutions, interference in land policies, clientelism and nepotism, and “a growing disregard for the rule of law leading to a situation where people are getting the feeling that it pays better to act like cowboys than to be law-abiding citizens.”

The 51-page document is an ambitious collection of proposals that not only introduce stricter ethics rules for lawmakers and government ministers, but also calls for the introduction of electronic counting during elections, e-voting and distance voting for overseas citizens.

The proposals are organised under 10 chapters that deal with solutions for what the PN says are an “erosion of values and principles” and to introduce a consensual approach in politics and appointments.

For example, the President of the Republic is to be appointed by a two-thirds majority of the House instead of by a simple majority.

But so will persons appointed to high public office have to face the two-thirds rule: such as the principal permanent secretary, the Commissioner of Police, the Commander of the Armed Forces – whose Labour appointees the PN have been at odds with – the Central Bank Governor, the chief statistician at the NSO, as well as Broadcasting Authority members, the Public Service Commission and the Employment Commission.

But Busuttil says he wants to allow the government two rounds to win a two-thirds majority, and in the failure of such, a simple majority would prevail in a third round of voting by MPs.

Meritocracy rules

Equally scrutinised will be chairpersons, CEOs of public authorities and nominated ambassadors, who will have to face a grilling in parliament.

The Commissioner for Public Standards – whose appointment is to be discussed in a Bill scheduled for January 2016 – will keep a register of all public appointments and their remuneration.

But importantly, and striking at the heart of Labour’s munificence, will be removing MPs from boards of public authorities, agencies or positions of trust with the government; force MPs to choose whether they are full-time or part-time MPs; prohibit ministers from retaining their private practice; restrict public appointments to not more than one institution for each individual appointee, with a maximum two consecutive terms in that role; and prohibiting senior party officials from holding positions of trust – a proposal that targets top party men such as Labour’s deputy leader, Toni Abela, who was also granted ministerial consultancies.

Busuttil also says he will put women in 50% of public appointments. “Improvements with respect to gender equality have been limited under Labour with the number of women appointed to public boards actually decreasing rather than increasing.”

He also says he will limit positions of trust “to whether they are truly inevitable” inside ministerial secretariats, vowing to end such spurious appointments as a dog handler, watchman and maintenance officer being directly appointed by a minister – or the much criticised €60,000 post for a medically boarded out police inspector after four days of leaving the force.

Stricter rules for politicians

The PN’s ethics blueprint targets Labour’s rewritten code, which first made light of ministers retaining their private practices – like former parliamentary secretary and surgeon Franco Mercieca – and then proceeded to retain the principle if it would be “in the national interest”.

In the PN’s proposals, a new code of ethics will require ministers to declare conflicts of interest to the Commissioner for Standards; “refrain from associating themselves with unsavoury characters”; oblige them to declare their spouses’ assets and refrain from appointing relatives or business partners to public positions; declare all gifts above €150 to the Commissioner; and register all meetings they hold with lobbyists.

The PN also takes issue with Joseph Muscat’s decision to avail himself of a €7,000 allowance accorded to politicians who use their own personal car as official ministerial car. “He set a bad example,” Busuttil says, “calling into question his moral authority to impose adequate discipline on the use of public funds.”

To that end, ministers and parliamentary secretaries will have to fly in economy rather than business class for official travel (unless it’s long haul, it specifies…); accompanying delegations abroad will be kept to a minimum, spouses and children travelling will not be financed by the State; and a ban on all ministers and the PM using their personal car as an official car.

Ministers will have to deliver a detailed declaration of assets within 15 days of their deadline to the Cabinet; and forbid the use of private email addresses for the conduct of ministerial work.

The new rules will also oblige MPs who get to know, or who have reasonable suspicion, that another MP has committed an abuse of power or an illegal act, including corruption, to report the matter to the authorities on pain of criminal punishment.

And a new unit is being proposed for the Permanent Commission Against Corruption to investigate cases.

The document also suggests that MPs would no longer be accorded parliamentary immunity from civil libel in parliament.

Media rules, public relations

With public service broadcasting forever in the grasp of political control, a reality not dissimilar to that under former PN administrations, the PN’s new document is now proposing a BBC-style set-up in a bid to wrest away the influence of the government from the appointment of directors and editors at the PBS.

It loftily says it will “guarantee once and for all” impartiality in public broadcasting by securing the freedom of PBS to operate at arm’s length from the government’s political influence; review the composition of the Broadcasting Authority to reduce the influence of the political parties – but not remove their appointees; and introduce a legal media balance requirement for political party TV stations, which so far enjoy a free-for-all when it comes to BA rules on impartiality.

It also says it will commit ministers to reply to questions from the media “in a spirit of transparency and in the shortest possible time”; ban public appointees and secretariat members from holding part-time jobs in the party media; publish an annual report of all spending on adverts in the media; and ensure public appointees “speak and behave in a manner that befits the national character of the position they occupy.”

Ministry for citizens’ rights

Busuttil says he has not abandoned his idea for a citizens’ rights ministry which he claims will fight clientelism by ending people’s dependence on ministerial largesse. “It will not compete with or limit access to the Ombudsman, but if anything, ensure that citizens are given adequate services from public administration in the first place.”

The ministry will provide a “one-stop-shop for complaints from citizens in relation to services provided by the public administration” and see that they are well served by the relevant public authority in good time. The ministry will liaise with other ministries “to put a stop, once and for all, to situations where people are sent on a wild good chase from one department to another.”

Apart from that, the PN wants to introduce a law for propositive referenda – Malta so far only allows abrogative referenda, and a petitions committee in parliament to receive and consider petitions from the public.

Public property… and some settling of dues?

It would have been remiss of the PN not to hit out at Labour’s asset-rich party: it wants to challenge the ownership of its party clubs in court in the light of the new party financing laws, and force the PL to return to the original owners any properties requisitioned under former administrations that are now being used as party clubs.

The PN also says that, if elected, the State will recover from the Labour Party “any damages that the Courts ordered it to pay to the dispossessed owners of property abusively or illegally used as local political party clubs” and stipulate a deadline within which parties must either purchase at market value the public property they are using, or pay rent at market rates or return it back.

Main takeaways from the PN’s good governance package

  • Introduction of electronic voting and overseas voting
  • Appointment of the President of the Republic by two-thirds of the House
  • Introduction of propositive referendum law
  • MPs can choose full-time parliamentary role
  • No MPs on government boards or public authorities
  • Detailed declaration of assets for ministers and spouses
  • Ministers cannot retain private practice while in office
  • Lobbyists’ register to be introduced with Commissioner of Public Standards
  • Two-thirds majority to appoint highest public officers such as police and army chiefs
  • Public service chiefs and ambassadors scrutinised by the House committees
  • Mandatory 50% quota for women in public appointments
  • No parliamentary immunity from civil libel for MPs
  • Creation of citizens’ rights ministry