Musumeci’s draft planning law reform back to the drawing board

The draft planning laws, deemed “obscene” by environmental organisations, architects and even the Labour Party’s own President, presented to Parliament last week just before the summer recess, have been unofficially shelved, The Shift is informed.

Although the two Bills remain on Parliament’s agenda, Prime Minister Robert Abela has instructed the Bill’s drafter, architect and lawyer Robert Musumeci, to revisit the proposals.

This latest decision requires Musumeci to eliminate controversial amendments drafted in response to directions from the Office of the Prime Minister.

Senior government sources told The Shift that following a backlash among Cabinet Ministers, with some complaining about a lack of consultation and of learning about the controversial changes through the media, the Prime Minister conceded his mistake and declared that he would not continue to push forward such draconian changes, at least until the next general elections.

Abela acknowledged that he had underestimated the public uproar over the radical proposals, including from within the Labour Party. For this reason, he admitted that he would reverse his decision and “relegate the proposed amendments to the back burner,” senior government officials told The Shift.

The sources said instructions have already been issued from Castille to Musumeci to prepare a new draft with controversial aspects deleted. “If the Bills ever resurface during this legislature, they will be a very watered-down version.”

The Shift is informed that Abela held various private meetings with developers over the past few weeks, before the text of the Bills was finalised and sent to Parliament.

Acknowledging that some of the proposals have been long overdue, particularly those related to new rules to disallow developers from continuing their projects during the hearing of an appeal, government sources stated that the prime minister clearly took the opportunity to insert proposals that were not on the agenda, aimed at facilitating further large-scale developer projects.

Among these are provisions to grant the Planning Minister more discretion to renew expired permits and for the Planning Authority’s Executive Council and Board to override local plans regarding building heights and ODZ developments.

According to the Chamber of Architects, which conducted a thorough review of the proposed bills, some of the amendments drafted by Musumeci take the country’s planning laws back to the 80s, to the time of the infamous former Minister Lorry Sant.

For example, the Bills propose a change in the hierarchy of planning documents so that the most recent version supersedes all other provisions, including local plans, rather than the other way around.

“This is illogical because all planning documents are, or should be, based on an older overriding document. It makes no sense to override a hierarchically superior planning document with a lower-ranked one simply because it’s more recent,” the architects insisted.

The Bills also propose that the Planning Board – typically consisting of political appointees – is empowered to overrule and depart from plans, policies, and regulations, provided the decision “explicitly references site-specific evidence and clearly articulates planning reasoning.” This proposal has been deemed to be very dangerous.

More controversial amendments the government inserted into the Bills include reduced consultation on new plans, shorter time frames for filing appeals, possible fines for so-called frivolous appeals, and concessions to those who built illegal structures to regularise their position by paying fines.

The Prime Minister’s Bills also propose that the Court cannot revoke permits even if they were issued illegally, but will only have the faculty to refer them back to the politically appointed Planning Authority’s appeals tribunal – the EPRT.

The Chamber of Architects and other organisations are insisting that the Court should always have the last say, as has always been the case.