Updated | PN parliamentary group to meet for the first time this year

A Nationalist Party parliamentary group meeting called for Monday afternoon has left some PN MPs complaining over the short notice • PN deputy leader David Agius says the short notice is common practice as Mario Galea calls out the moaners

The PN parliamentary group will be meeting for the first time this year on Monday afternoon
The PN parliamentary group will be meeting for the first time this year on Monday afternoon

Updated at 2pm with reaction by Mario Galea 

A long-awaited meeting of the Nationalist Party’s parliamentary group will be held on Monday afternoon.

The meeting called for 5.30pm was set on Monday morning, with some MPs who spoke to this newspaper complaining about the short notice.

They noted that the meeting had intentionally been called on short notice to ensure that those who had already set appointments would not be able to attend. This is the first parliamentary group meeting of the year and comes after a turbulent Christmas period for PN leader Adrian Delia.

However, PN deputy leader David Agius told MaltaToday that in his 10 years’ experience as Whip, and one-and-a half years as deputy leader, meetings of the parliamentary group called at short notice were “very common”.

"Anybody complaining about this should know that this has happened very often in the past, and after all, the meeting is being held during parliamentary hours when MPs are supposed to be in parliament," he said, adding the meeting was being held in Parliament.

Parliament meets at 4pm and ends at 7.30pm.

In separate comments, PN Whip Robert Cutajar said there had been other times when meetings were called on short notice.

Asked whether an agenda had been set, Cutajar said it was never the case that an itemised agenda was sent before and that the agenda was always "parliamentary work".

In an immediate reaction on his Facebook wall, veteran PN MP Mario Galea called out the anonymous MPs complaining about the short notice, insisting this was common practice. "This is not the first time that parliamentary group meetings were called on the same day... these MPs think we do not know who they are. They have sworn to destroy the PN for their personal ambitions," Galea said.

PN leader Adrian Delia has been facing internal dissent by some MPs and party members opposed to his leadership.

Earlier this month, the party’s administrative council declared its unanimous support for Delia, with Secretary General Clyde Puli declaring that it was now business as usual for the PN.