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3 maltatoday | WEDNESDAY • 13 JANUARY 2021 NEWS KURT SANSONE PROPOSED legal changes to ensure more women are elected to parliament have been criticised by ADPD because they only favour candidates of the major parties. Using strong language, ADPD said the proposed changes are "a historic perver- sion" of the quota system that will serve Labour and Nationalist women candidates over the rest. "Despite the Prime Minister's and some other's claim that the bill amending the electoral system currently being discussed in parliament is 'historic', it is in fact yet an- other case of collusion between PL and PN so that they continue to avoid a real reform of the electoral system and instead get a top-up bonus of six unelected MPs each," ADPD spokesperson Sandra Gauci said. Parliament yesterday started discussing a gender corrective mechanism that will award up to 12 additional seats to women if only two parties are elected to parliament. Gauci insisted that top-ups and bloating parliament through extra seats are not quotas, accusing the two major parties of perverting the concept of quotas and rep- resentation. "The bill is discriminatory because it is a top-up mechanism which is only set into motion if PL or PN candidates are elect- ed to parliament. Discrimination based on party affiliation is purposefully written into the bill. Some women are more equal than others for Rosianne Cutajar, Bernard Grech, Robert Abela and Claudette Butti- gieg. It is ironic that the concepts of 'equal- ity' and 'quota' are perverted so much to fit into the PL and PN scheme of things," she said. ADPD Secretary General Ralph Cassar said that a proper representative elec- toral system, which incorporates gender representation is achieved by a system in which all votes have equal value. He ac- cused the parties of colluding to skew the system in their favour. "The current system applies the concept of proportionality only to PL and PN. In fact, top-up systems are already in place, increasing the size of parliament over and above the five MPs per electoral district. This top-up 'corrective mechanism', sim- ilar to the proposed new gender top-up, applies only to PL and PN," Cassar said. ADPD says quota system only favours Labour and Nationalist women candidates CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 The Bill put forward by government makes no such provision and the mech- anism will only kick in if two parties are represented in parliament. Another proposal is for a clearer rank- ing system for women candidates who were eliminated that will be based on the percentage of the quota. Schiavone said this was all the more important given that Gozo was consti- tutionally one district irrespective of its population. The government Bill proposes an un- clear ranking system that either depends on votes or percentage of the quota. Grech hits out at PM Opposition leader Bernard Grech hit out at the Prime Minister for failing to speak about the proposed gender equality bill in his parliamentary speech on Mon- day evening. Grech said the opposition is in favour of the bill, but insisted its proposed amend- ments would ensure it can be properly applied to Malta's context. He said that the bill alone will not solve the problem of female representation in the country's leadership. "We must also look at the cultural con- text of why women are not getting into politics. We have more female students and graduates, so something, somewhere is going wrong," he said. He also said that a 'sunset clause' within the proposed law, which would make the law no longer applicable if balanced rep- resentation between the sexes is reached in the House, helped the opposition to agree even more. Grech called out Prime Minister Robert Abela for his speech on Monday evening, stating he was more focused on attacking the opposition rather than debating the bill. "This is your problem, you have become so arrogant that you don't want to listen. Yesterday he said how proud he was of the proposed constitutional amendment, but today he isn't even here," Grech said. In his speech, the PM yesterday listed a number of firsts the Labour governments have achieved throughout the years in equality between the sexes. "But yet he didn't have the courage to congratulate Roberta Metsola for becom- ing first-vice president in the European Parliament," he said He said the PM is only interested in hearing himself talk. "This is a PM who removes people who do not agree with him," Grech said, hint- ing at the removal of consultant Kenneth Grech from the COVID response team. Grech concluded by appealing to the government to accept the opposition's amendments. "Is it possible no one can help you im- prove the law, for the benefit of all wom- en in the country?" he said. The mechanism will yield success – Chris Fearne Deputy Prime Minister also addressed parliament, stating that leaps forward in equality have always been the work of a Labour government. "We believe veryone in society should have the same opportunities, no matter their skin colour, religion or gender," he said. He said that such a mechanism had al- ready yielded success when implemented within Labour Party structures, and feels that the same success will be achieved in parliament. Fearne stated that the bill should be dedicated to the first female Maltese President Agatha Barbara. "She got elected in this parliament for the first time when just 24 years old and went to do great things in politics, and if she were here today she would be sup- porting us," he said. 'Undemocratic' – Marlene Farrugia Independent MP Marlene Farrugia said that while everyone was in favour of bal- anced representation in parliament, the bill as proposed undermines democracy by electing people who are not chosen by voters. "Women will end up being tokens in parliament," she said. The MEP elections, she said, are a clear indication of how people vote for women when they want to. "This bill is a full-blown attack on meri- tocracy," she said. The PN's proposals 1. Mechanism should kick in if more than two parties are represented in parliament The PN is proposing that if a third party elects at least five MPs it should also benefit from an increase in seats of the under-represented gender. The seat or seats awarded to the third party will be taken from the maximum of six awarded to the side of the House the party will be sitting on – if the third party sits in the Opposition, the additional seat/s will be taken from the Opposition and if it forms part of a government coalition it will take its seat/s from those awarded to the governing side. The amendment does not change the maximum of 12 seats (six to either side) that the mechanism will award to the under- represented gender. 2. Immediate casual elections The PN is proposing that casual elections in those cases where a candidate is elected on two districts take place immediately. The PN is suggesting an automatic system will kick in and the candidate will give up that district on which he scored the lowest first count result expressed as a percentage of the quota. In this way, with the electronic vote counting introduced two years ago, the casual elections can take place immediately so that the composition of parliament is known on the night and the gender corrective mechanism will kick as quickly as possible. This ensures the prime minister will have a full parliamentary complement as early as possible to be able to choose his Cabinet from. 3. Clearer ranking of women candidates The PN agrees that the mechanism should first elect those women candidates who were left standing at the last count but failed to get elected. But it is proposing a clearer ranking system for those women candidates that were eliminated and who will be in the running for the extra seats if needed. The PN is saying that the ranking should be based on the last count votes obtained by the eliminated women candidates, expressed as a percentage of the district quota they contested in. The PN proposal makes the ranking clearer since the government proposal speaks of either 'the number of votes obtained' or 'votes as a percentage of the district quota', leaving it open to interpretation. 4. Changes to be done by two-thirds vote The PN wants to make sure that any changes to the gender corrective mechanism in the future should be enacted by a two-thirds vote in parliament. 'Arrogant' PM will not listen to others - Grech PN MP Hermann Schiavoine