Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/997322
25 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 24 JUNE 2018 OPINION capture, keeping or other judi- cious use of certain birds in small numbers." Malta obviously went for the last option: even though it is clear at a glance it can- not possibly be made to fit the local context. The conditions of supervision were not 'strict'; the method is not 'selective' (it cannot be, seeing as we use clap-nets... which are illegal in other parts of Europe, precisely because they tend to be indis- criminate); the numbers are not 'small' (we have the highest density of trappers in the EU) ... but by far the most glaring problem is that – to quote di- rectly from the ruling – "recrea- tional trapping of birds cannot be considered judicious." Boom! There, in a nutshell, is Malta's entire defence blown out of the water. All this time we have argued – irration- ally – that 'trapping birds for fun' constitutes some kind of valid justification for breaking a directive that exists to protect wild birds from precisely that sort of thing. Even worse, successive governments – but this one more than any other – have consistently supple- mented that bizarre reasoning by pointing towards their own electoral mandates. How many times have we heard it before? "We are bound by an electoral promise to do everything in our power to get the best deal for hunters and trappers, blah blah blah"... Excuse me, but... who gives a flying finch what the Maltese government promised to which sector of the Maltese popula- tion? Why should the European Court of Justice be even re- motely swayed by the fact that successive governments have always made promises they knew (or should have known) they couldn't possibly keep? After all, it exists to interpret and apply European law... not to help local political parties win elections. But in any case: the ruling is there, and it very clearly demol- ishes the only plank Malta ever thought it had when it came to simply exempting itself from European law at will. Now, I reckon the people who made all these deceitful promises owe us a few answers... all of us, not just the immediate victims of their deception: i.e., the trap- pers themselves. I, for one, would like to know why the present government obstinately chose to waste so much money and resources to fight such a pointless, doomed legal battle for so long. Let's start with the money. How much did this case cost the taxpayer, anyway? It's not just the legal expenses involved in actually slugging it out in Luxembourg. The government has been pouring resources into this cause for a number of years now: it has paid consultants to draw up reports, it has diverted bodies such as the Ornis Com- mittee and the Wild Birds Regulatory Unit from their main raison d'etre, to concen- trate solely on this one issue... and even if the 'supervision' proved insufficient in the end, the Police's Administrative Law Enforcement sector still had to waste time and manpower on 'monitoring' what was, effec- tively, an illegal activity. So, when you tot it all up... how many millions of euros did we all just flush down the toilet, with nothing to show for it in the end but a humiliating take- down by the European Court of Justice? This gives rise to another con- sideration, but I won't bother too much with it because... well, it's kind of pointless, re- ally. Don't laugh, but... what about political responsibility? Does anyone, at any level, assume any form of blame whatsoever for the fiasco..? No prizes for guessing cor- rectly. Meanwhile, a slightly more pressing – and answer- able – concern is.... well, what happens now? Do we bow to the ECJ's verdict, and say: "That's it, folks... no more trapping?" Or do we just pretend the whole thing never happened at all, and hope for better luck next time? Unfortunately, we already have the answer to that one. Instead of both parties simply acknowledging that they lied to the trappers – and to the rest of us as well – by insisting it was possible to apply this deroga- tion... they are both, even now, arguing that it can still be applied. Parliamentary Secretary for Animal Rights (!) Clint Camill- eri even stated that "govern- ment did not do anything ille- gal in applying the derogation" – after the ECJ only just ruled that... erm... actually yes, it did – and that it "will be deciding on a course of action [after] an accurate analysis of the verdict is complete." Not to be outdone, Adrian Delia's PN is now "appealing for serious dialogue with the European Commission and with trappers in order to find a way of sustainably maintaining trapping in a way that doesn't go against the provisions of the Birds Directive." I would think that's rather dif- ficult, after the European Court very clearly established that 'recreational trapping' cannot be justified as the sole reason to apply a derogation. But there you have it. Both Labour and Nationalist are reacting as though there was still any- thing left of their nonsensical argument, after it was blown to smithereens by the ECJ; and I don't really blame then, either, because... well, it's our money and resources, not their own, that both a Nationalist and/or Labour government will be only too happy to keep squandering in pursuit of a lost cause. Since when has either of them ever given a toss about simply appropriating the coun- try's assets, and using them to fight their own private political battles? And since when, for that matter, has any Maltese taxpayer ever really complained about so blatantly robbed and cheated, every single time? No, indeed. Not only do we all accept that situation, but we even applaud and encour- age 'our' parties to forge ahead with their pointless conflict... even it means dragging the en- tire country into one pointless legal wrangle after another. So I guess we'd all better start bracing ourselves for an inevitable second ruling, after Malta once again chooses to defy the European Commis- sion by opening the trapping season again next October. That, by the way, is an actual prediction I'm making from now, in the absence of any sarcasm whatsoever. This battle isn't over yet... and it won't be over, for as long as people continue to place trust in political parties that just keep lying to us, over and over again. Both Labour and Nationalist are reacting as though there was still anything left of their nonsensical argument