Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1527188
10 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 29 SEPTEMBER 2024 ANALYSIS The Planning Authority (PA) is proposing an amendment to the Sanitary Regulations to address situations where the dimensions of a development deviate by not more than 2 centimetres less than the minimum requirements. Currently there is strict adherence to specific dimensions in accordance with the Development Planning (Health and Sanitary) Regulations to ensure health, safety, and usability standards. However, rigid enforcement of these dimensions has occasionally resulted in practical challenges during and after the construction phase. The PA deems that the slight deviation from the minimum dimensions is acceptable and is justifiable especially when considering that the development is already built, and such slight deviation does not undermine the integrity of sanitary laws. This margin of 2 centimetres is within acceptable limits to ensure that the primary objectives of SL. 552.22 are met, such that the health and safety of occupants are not adversely affected. The proposed amendments to the Development Planning (Health and Sanitary) Regulations may be viewed from the PA's website: www.pa.org.mt/consultation The Planning Authority invites the public to submit representations to the proposed amendments. Submissions are to be sent by email to: sanita.amendment@pa.org.mt Submissions must be sent to the Authority not later than the 9th October 2024. www.pa.org.mt HAVE YOUR SAY OPEN PUBLIC CONSULTATION Development Planning (Health and Sanitary) (Amendment) Regulations PLANNING AUTHORITY Europe's grim reality, a defence The next European Commission will have a dedicated commissioner for defence in what is a sign of the times. Kurt Sansone explores whether Malta has a role to play in the construction of the EU's security and defence architecture. THE European Union's largest ever expansion 20 years ago was hailed as the start of peaceful unity in a continent just emerging from the Cold War. The feeling of a new beginning for Europe was captured in the words of then Austrian chancellor Wolfgang Schüssel: "For us Aus- trians, who grew up with a border secured by barbed wire, minefields and watchtowers, from an inter- nal point of view the 21st century has in many ways only just begun. It's what we have dreamed of." Schüssel spoke in Athens on 16 April 2003 when 10 new coun- tries, including Malta, signed the EU accession treaty. They formal- ly joined the bloc a year later. Eight of the new member states were former Communist coun- tries that only a decade earlier stood on the opposite side of the Iron Curtain that split the conti- nent. Today, the EU's 'peaceful unity' remains intact despite tensions between the member states but never as now has the bloc faced a full-blown war in its immediate neighbourhood. Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 shattered the peace and stability Europe had come to cherish, prompting EU leaders to start speaking the language of war. "We have to be prepared for anything," European Parliament President Roberta Metsola told Romania's television news chan- nel Digi24 in March last year as Vladimir Putin threatened to de- ploy tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus. In January, this year German What does Malta spend on its military? In 2024, the Armed Forces of Malta had an allocated budget of €85.7 million of which €8.5 million was earmarked for capital expenditure and the bulk (€64.6m) earmarked for wages. The estimated total spend would equate to approximately 0.4% of Malta's GDP, which is half the spend of NATO member Luxembourg (0.7% of GDP). The AFM has a complement of around 2,000 military personnel. A soldier scaling the side of a vessel during a ship boarding exercise (Photo: AFM/Facebook)