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maltatoday | SUNDAY • 3 APRIL 2022 10 NEWS JAM ES DEBONO THE Planning Authority's plan- ning commission issued 698 permits during the five-week electoral campaign in Malta, and refused just 38, with 188 permits issued in the final week of the campaign. In the exact corresponding pe- riod in 2021, which was not an election year, the PA had issued 513 permits and refused 59. This suggests that more per- mits were issued and less per- mits were refused during the electoral campaign. But this was nothing comparable to the 2017 election, when during the cam- paign a record 1,247 permits were issued. The PA's regularisation board, which is responsible with legal- ising minor illegalities within development zones, issued 123 permits down from 588 in 2017. MaltaToday has been docu- menting the power of incum- bency in the planning sector since 2008. While in the five- week 2008 campaign 789 per- mits were issued, only 321 per- mits were issued in the 12-week 2013 campaign. But this shot up again to 1,247 permits during the five-week 2017 campaign. The most controversial per- mit issued during the 2022 campaign was the one for the construction of 73 flats and 60 garages, just 350 metres away from the Sannat cliffs' edge. The application was submitted by mega-developer Joseph Portel- li's business partner Mark Agius and was approved just days after Portelli attended a meeting with Prime Minister Robert Abela. Objectors to the project de- nounced the splitting of the project into three separate ap- Permits issued in last four elections 2008 2013 2017 2022 Planning permits 789 321 1247 689 Final week 181 61 233 188 Regularisation - - 588 123 Less power of incumbency at Planning Authority 698 planning permits issued during five- week electoral campaign, down from a record 1,247 permits in 2017 campaign JAMES DEBONO PLANS for a coastal restaurant and offices on the Ta' Xbiex promenade have been resub- mitted by the transport authority, after initial plans were withdrawn. Having abandoned a controversial plan for offices and a restaurant inside the Council of Europe gardens, Transport Malta has pre- sented a new application for the restaurant on the reorganised promenade between the garden and the sea. The one-storey building will include a 163sq.m restaurant, a 162sq.m office, and 180 square metres for outside catering. The Superintendence for Cultural Heritage welcomed the fact that the proposed devel- opment is no longer located inside the es- tablished public garden and will not impact directly on the garden. Nevertheless, the Superintendence still ex- pressed its concern that the marina office and its facilities together, including a fuelling area for boats, creates "a very extensive de- velopment that is out of scale with the con- text." Moreover, the foreshore location between the garden and the sea will inevitably impact on views on the garden towards the sea and Manuel Island. The Superintendence said it would be favourable to the mitigation of such inevitable impacts with amended draw- ings addressing these issues. The plans also refer to a separate applica- tion, which will involve a "redesign" of the garden, that will reorganise street parking to create a promenade for pedestrians. A 25-year concession was awarded by public tender to the Gzira Gardens Marina Consor- tium in 2018, a project which had attracted 14 bids. But the application for an "operator area", which includes the proposed restau- rant, have both been presented by Transport Malta, and not by the concessionaires. Ta' Xbiex marina restaurant moved to foreshore in latest plans JAMES DEBONO A legal saga to grant a pharmacy licence in the hamlet of Burmarrad has taken a new twist after Mr Justice Robert Mangion or- dered the Superintendent of Public Health to process an application for a pharmacy there. In a court sentence the judge decreed that Burmarrad should be considered as a "town or village" under regulations govern- ing pharmacy licences. It also declared that the Superintendent had acted "illegally" and "unreasonably" in blocking an application for a pharmacy along Triq Burmarrad and gave the authorities two months to process the application. The law regulating the issue of pharmacy licences approved in 2007 states that every town and village should have a pharmacy. But the law was approved before the setting up of administrative councils in 2009 and its definition of what constitutes a town or vil- lage refers only to places which either have a local council, or a committee appointed by the local council. According to the authority responsible for pharmacy licences, such a definition does not apply to those hamlets which since 2009 have been administrated by an elected ad- ministrative council, instead of an appointed committee. The authority used this legal justification to deny an application by the owner of a beauty clinic for a pharmacy in Burmarrad, claiming that the hamlet did not qualify as a town or village, according to the terms of the law. The applicant was told that he was only el- igible to be placed on a waiting list of appli- cants for a new pharmacy in St Paul's Bay. Residents in Burmarrad have long been complaining that they are being deprived of a pharmacy service in their locality, so much so that in 2010 they handed a petition to this effect to the then health minister Dr. Joe Cassar. The Ombudsman of the time, Chief Justice Emeritus J. Said Pullicino, had investigated a complaint following reluctance by the pub- lic health superintendent Dr Ray Busuttil to grant a pharmacy license in this village. In a complaint to former Ombudsman Jo- seph Said Pullicino, the latter insisted that the law should now apply to hamlets with an elected council. "It is unfair to claim that these hamlets qualified for a pharmacy when they were run by a committee appointed by the local council and have lost this right when the citizens started electing the com- mittee administrating the locality." Despite communications with the Parlia- mentary Petitions Committee in 2012, no processing of such an application occurred. Whilst there is the possibility of appeal, residents are now hopeful that the present public health superintendent will amend the Pharmacy Licensing Regulations. They also hope that government gives the Burmarrad community its due consideration when it comes to the provision of public health ser- vices. Burmarrad may finally get pharmacy after court lambasts 'illegal' action by Superintendence 20-year saga for Burmarrad to get its own pharmacy