Government and Labour lock horns over ‘Fairmount’ multi-million fiasco
Government and the Labour Party traded salvos yesterday over the findings of a PricewaterhouseCoopers report that revealed a shocking €37 million in losses incurred by the shipyards on two conversion projects.
While the Labour Party demanded the immediate resignation of infrastructure minister Austin Gatt, who should shoulder the political responsibility for the losses, a Minsitry statement replied by asking the PL who within the party would shoulder the losses incurred by the same shipyards during the two years of Labour in government between 1996 and 1998.
According to the ministry, the dockyard lost some €35 million in each of the two years Labour was in government, meaning that the amount which was scandalising the PL now had happened in every year that it was in government. The losses had accumulated from a number of small projects, but no one assumed responsibility.
Speaking during a press conference yesterday, PL deputy leader Anglu Farrugia and parliamentarian Helena Dalli insisted that Austin Gatt should not only shoulder his political responsibility for the losses incurred by the shipyards that fall under his direct administration, but also for what they defined as “anomalies” that come out of the PricewaterhouseCoopers report on the same losses.
In their attack, Anglu Farrugia and Helena Dalli said that the PWC report uncovered gross failures in administration by the shipyards executive management, and that it was shameful how, at the time the losses were becoming rather evident, government was giving the impression that the company was faring well.
They both reacted to a PN statement issued earlier in the day on the same matter, and stressed that the PN and government should be ashamed to blame the shipyard workers for the losses, and rebuked the allegation that the losses were the responsibility of the PL’s and GWU’s interference in the company.
Helena Dalli asked why the report was issued now when Minister Austin Gatt had said a year ago that it was at an advanced stage, and it was compiled at a time when the shipyard’s chief executive’s contract had expired, and left without being held to account.
The company’s marketing manager – known to be a central figure in the whole issue – “had been allowed to flee and could not be traced for comments by the auditors.”
Both MPs thanked the workers for their efforts and contribution to the company, and accused government and the company’s administration of “total mismanagement,” to the detriment of the same workers and the country as a whole.
In its reply to the claims made during the PL’s press conference, the Infrastructure ministry said that it was a Labour run government which insisted that the dockyard needed to diversify from ship repair, but it was the PN government which eventually freed the taxpayers from the burden which the dockyard losses had become.
The ministry said the PL and the GWU had always used the shipyard as a political football and that was one of the main reasons why the dockyard had been reduced to its current state.
The Fairmount projects were acknowledged by the government as the main reason for the reversal of the progress Malta Shipyards had been registering since restructuring took place in 2003.
However, in a statement issued on Friday night, the Ministry for Investments and Infrastructure, which published the 161-page PWC report, said losses incurred by Malta Shipyards on the two contracts showed that while the company had to diversify its activities, it lacked the necessary contractual, planning and productive abilities.
The GWU said it was studying the report but expressed its dismay with the fact that the investigation was conducted by a company chosen by the minister, and insisted for a public inquiry into the two contracts.
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