Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1506906
A couple of weeks ago, I inter- viewed Sliema mayor John Pil- low about the garbage crisis cur- rently affecting that locality; and pretty much everywhere else in Malta and Gozo. Now: in the course of any inter- view, there will always be one or two questions/answers that – for various reasons - end up getting omitted from the published arti- cle. In this case, there were two. At one point, Mr Pillow gave me a lengthy explanation of why 'Airbnbs' (and the recent prolif- eration thereof) had contribut- ed massively to the problem. It seems that the management of such facilities usually hire do- mestic cleaners, every time the apartments are collectively va- cated. The result is that the ac- cumulated garbage of anywhere up to 30/40 apartments, tends to all get dumped onto the street, at the same time: which, in many cases, will not be 'the same time' as the scheduled garbage collec- tion. This, Pillow argued, was one of the major causes of the garbage crisis, in Sliema and other areas. Now: why did I leave this part out, you might be asking? Sim- ple. John Pillow had also given comments to another news re- port, published in the same edi- tion of MaltaToday. And as this point had already been covered: I felt it would be a case of need- less repetition. I thought I'd just clarify that: because I noticed a few com- ments criticising the Sliema mayor, for not mentioning 'Air- bnbs' at all. As for the second omission: it's a little more complicated, so bear with me a while. In that interview, John Pillow also described how Malta's gar- bage-collection scheduled had been changed, in 2019, from a lo- cal, to a regional level: "before, it was the local council that issued the call for tenders. [...] Now, on the other hand – because it is a national scheme – the tenders are issued by the Department of Contracts; and the contractors are chosen on a regional level (in other words, all six regions have their own contractor)." It was at this point that I asked him WHY he thought the sys- tem had been changed, in the first place. This was his exact reply: "I'm not sure, to tell you the truth. And I wouldn't want to say something that will later turn out to be incorrect. But as far as I remember, it had some- thing to do with EU funds. There was some funding, that was tied to having regional councils... but more than that, I can't tell you." Right: I trust you can all see for yourselves, why I chose to leave that part out. If the interviewee himself was admitting that he didn't really know the answer... there is not much sense in re- peating what he said, is there? (And besides: that sort of thing can land both interviewer, and interviewee, into quite a lot of trouble, you know...) At the same time, however: it irked me to have to omit that question... because I thought (and still think) that it remains the single, most crucial, missing jigsaw-puzzle piece: if we are to truly understand why Malta's national waste-management strategy has proved to be such an abject, utter failure. In any case: I've done a little digging, since then... and it turns out that John Pillow's hunch was not entirely 'unfounded', after all. Admittedly, it remains unclear whether 'EU funding' constitutes the ONLY reason, why a country as small as Malta – which has never had a histo- ry of 'regional division', to begin with – decided to adopt such an outlandish, and hopeless unsuit- able 'regional' set-up, for its own national administration. But two things immediately become clear (even without very much digging, at all). 1) Malta did indeed adopt a 'Regional Council', in 2011: by means of which, the islands were (somewhat arbitrarily) divided into five 'regions': which became six, in 2021... "in order to ensure a more equitable distribution of local councils within each region (11 on average, with an excep- tion of 14 in Gozo)." 2) There is a lot (but a LOT) of EU-funding that is directly linked to such a system: mostly through the 'Cohesion Funds' programmes, which "finance programmes in shared respon- sibility between the European Commission and NATIONAL and REGIONAL authorities in Member States." (Translation: 'Local Councils are NOT eligi- ble. Only Governments, and Re- gional Councils, need apply...') 2) Malta has, in fact, benefitted from untold millions of euros' worth of Cohesion Funds, since 2011. Last June, for instance, a 'Multi-Material Recovery Facil- ity' was inaugurated in Ħal Far. We were told that: "The project benefitted from €11.4 million from the Cohesion Fund and will focus on waste such as wood, mattresses, textiles, flat glass, waste electrical and electronic equipment, expanded polysty- rene, gypsum and tyres." The Commission website also adds that: "In 2014-2020, Malta benefitted from Cohesion Policy funding worth more than €1 bil- lion, including to finance other environment relevant projects..." And lastly... 3) We can all now not only see the consequence of all these changes, with our own eyes (and smell them, with our own nos- trils)... but we can even accu- rately measure the 'success' of maltatoday | SUNDAY • 3 SEPTEMBER 2023 10 OPINION There are other places, apart from freezers, to stuff our organic waste... Raphael Vassallo