Private property is private
Maaaaa, Ken, how riiiiiiiggghhhhhttt you arrrrre.
It never fails to astonish me how progressive liberal Labour supporters just don’t get the concept of private property. Not so long ago we had a Labour member of the Valletta local council, Norman Shaw, posting pictures of dilapidated Valletta houses on his Facebook page, and telling us how he would force the owners to do them up, and if they fail to do so, the state/council should move in against the owners’ will, do the work then send the owners the bill.
Now we have Astrid Vella, squeaking a variation on the same theme in a comment beneath Kenneth Zammit Tabona’s (Kitten from Malta…) column last Tuesday in Times of Malta, in which he described Piano’s parliament building as a “giant cheese-grater”.
Ken,I could not agree more with everything you say, especially the fact that the 85million spent on the Parliament could have been spent restoring ALL of Valletta, &possibly more.It breaks my heart to walk the streets of our capital &see those beautiful palazzos literally crumbling before our eyes.How depressing that our politicians did not have the minimum sense to see this &get priorities right.
Where did these people get the idea that governments can go about restoring houses which belong to private citizens, whether they want them restored or not – or that you can restore the facade of a building while leaving the structure unsound and the interior decaying?
The banality of it all just amazes me.
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Not to mention her piss-poor sense of purchasing power: “85 million … could have been spent on restoring ALL of Valletta, & possibly more”. Yeah right.
She expected the previous administration to force the sale of the site proposed for development at Ramla l-Hamra.
Her words, ‘if it cannot be developed it shouldn’t cost that much’.
She also mistook a pair of 19th century columns ravaged by the Sliema Grigal channeled up a narrow lane as baroque period. And Tigne’ for Ghar id-Dud.
[Daphne – Oh it was MUCH worse than that. She went nuts about a house a few paces away from Stella Maris church, claiming that it shouldn’t be pulled down because it was ‘baroque’. I happened to know exactly which house it was because for 21 years I lived round the corner from it. It was nondescript late 19th century, if that. But because somebody had stuck a column on each side of the front door, it was ‘baroque’. When I wrote that this house was not baroque, and that there are no baroque buildings in Sliema and never were, Mrs Vella went berserk.
I found it just incredible that somebody who grew up in Stella Maris parish, as I did, had no idea that it is Sliema’s original parish, where Sliema’s original buildings are, and that none of it predates the mid-19th century because before that it just wasn’t safe to build or live there as the coast was exposed to piracy despite the near presence of Tigne fort. As evidence of how there were streets and houses in Sliema during the ‘baroque period’, Mrs Vella produced – to my embarrassment on her behalf (and this to counter not me but – what presumptuous arrogance – Conrad Thake) – a map of Tigne Fort. “Look, there are the streets and houses!” It had to be patiently pointed out to her that the ‘houses’ were the fort’s administration buildings, barracks and officers’ quarters and the ‘streets’ were the spaces between them. She had thought of a fort as a single, tower-like structure, rather than what it actually is – a fortified permanent encampment for military personnel engaged in defence. It’s enough to make you tear your hair out.]
I bet both wax lyrical on period diamond pattern rustication. But that’s familiar and in formula.
Next, the ‘incongruous’ material chosen for the planar layering exalting the blurring of interface.
Sloowly now, you’ll get it.
Er, Fort Tigné was only built in 1792. The nearest fort during the age of pirate incursions was Valletta, and then Fort Manoel.
Speaking of which, did Astrid Vella get an iced bun?
[Daphne – Piracy was still considered a risk in the early 19th century. Sliema began going up halfway through the century, when it became clear that the British and their navy weren’t going home. Stella Maris parish, where the first homes were built, was resolutely, unabashedly Victorian, with lashings of Art Nouveau and many houses that date no further back than between the two wars.]
Exactly, it was the new town, neo-gothic the thing to have.
I mean, by her reasoning the one next to Mdina Cathedral should be torn down, St.Paul’s should lose it’s spire and Evans prettified.
I cannot understand how they even expect to be considered versed in aesthetics when all they want is more of the same.
E che du’coglioni. Literally.
Why would a government use taxpayer’s money to restore a privately owned building?
And then what? Let the owners enjoy a renovated residence for free or make money out of it?
Typically Labour!
There is no distinction between private and public. All a government has to do is create the right market conditions.
I tend to think that V18, the Piano project and all the restoration of public buildings and structures in Valletta by the previous administration will add/have added value to any building in the city and thus incentivise restoration and use of empty buildings…
I guess that the euro 85 million spent on the Piano project have increased the total value of Valletta properties by euro 800 million.
If that property is transferred and the government collects let us say 10% tax on transfer value, the government would recover the full cost of the Piano project.
…and self-appointed-arbiter-of-culture Ken’s description of Piano’s building is like saying that Einstein’s Theory of Relativity is like a mediocre columnist’s rambling about science. What pathetic people.
These c*nts must look in the mirror, desperately trying to find ways to justify their existence.
Talking mindless bollocks is the outcome of that dialogue.
I wonder what she thinks about the removal of the resident parking scheme now… with all the traffic that will seep into Valletta, palazzos will crumble before her eyes much faster.
Same old Labour and same old Labourites.
So why are we restoring the Auberges, Cathedrals? Those were or are private too.
[Daphne – They are not. Auberges are property of the state, having passed from the Order of St John directly to the succession of powers: French, British, Maltese. St John’s Cathedral falls between two stools: as the property of the Order of St John, it should have moved along with their other buildings. But being a functioning church, the Roman Catholic administration had to become involved, so the cathedral’s administration is a joint church-state project.]
The ownership of St John’s co-Cathedral is far more complex and unsure than that.
St John was the personal property of Grand Master La Cassiere, who had bought the land in his own name and over it built the church out of his own pocket.
In his will, La Cassiere left the church to the Order of St John, on the express condition that should the Order not make use of it for any reason, St John would devolve on the Maltese Church (the Bishop).
When Napoleon captured Malta, the property of the Order passed to the new French government – but did St John fall under this category, in view of the express condition in La Cassiere’s will?
To complicate matters ever further, Napoleon signed a piece of paper by which (after stripping the church of most of its treasures) he “bequeathed” the church to the Bishop of Malta.
The British government and the church agreed to disagree on the ownership of St John. They both claimed it belonged to them and neither of them ever dared to test their claims in court. They reached a tacit modus vivendi to cooperate “without prejudice”.
That accounts for the joint Church and Government Foundation to administer St John. The two entities still claim exclusive ownership, but work hand in hand, independently of the intractable legal complexities underlying the ownership issue.
[Daphne – Gosh, thanks. A fantastic explanation.]
According to the authoritative and may I add Labour leaning historian “Il-kavallier Guze’ Galea” La Cassier left in his will that if the knights were to leave the island Saint John’s will automatically become Church property.
I vividly recall him stating this on his radio program on Xandir Malta, when the minister for culture Alex Sceberras Trigona tried to lay his hands on this gem.After Galea’s statement AST said that Saint John’s belongs to the Maltese.
During the British period a governor was taken to court by the archbishop because government employees were sent to remove a marble slab from the cathedral.
In the 50s Mintoff organised the restoration of Caravaggio’s “The beheading of Saint John”. When it was returned from Italy, Mintoff placed it in some public museum, Archbishop Gonzi fought back and had it back in it’s rightful place , the oratory.
That’s not all.
Mintoff (yes, him again) back in the late 1970s, had come up with a cunning plan for the government to take over St John’s Cathedral.
But as storicus says, there were legal complexities. So he engaged a (foreign) expert to track down all the documents which would bolster his case. The whole thing came to nothing when antipathy for the hated barrani and a certain little incident in the Aouzou Strip made the situation too hot for foreigners in Malta.
Exactly. In governmental intervention is solicited, then stately homes, palazzos etc will obviously have to be passed on to the state. Else the owners would need to come up with some kind of business plan or ask a charity. There should also be laws were people can pass on property to the state in lieu of inheritance taxes, taxes, etc.
[Daphne – That last has been happening for yonks. It’s how the state got Palazzo Francia opposite parliament house.]
Ferreira?
Then why all this fuss? Those who can’t afford to manage their estate should donate some of it to the state. End of story.
[Daphne – We no longer have punitive inheritance tax, Joe. Why should they donate anything to the state when they can sell it? That property is theft is a Marxist dictum.]
I was talking about tax and inheritance tax. ‘Donate’ in lieu of money owed to the state.
[Daphne – If you give your property to the state instead of inheritance tax owed, it’s not a donation but a payment.]
The squeaky one and the egomaniac kitten claim to be terribly fond of those crumbling palazzos, but not so fond that they will actually buy one, restore it and live in it. Kitten bought a flat in St Julian’s and when Astrid splashed out beyond her Sliema flat in the family block (replacing a Victorian townhouse), she bought not a house in Valletta, but one in Gozo, and spent her money restoring that instead.
If building a pool is restoration, I’m a vandal.
Better a giant cheese grater than a teapot, with a bowtie attached to it.
Bet astrid is going to go berserk now that I believe they are finally going to develop Il-Pjazzetta car park outside her flat, blocking her view.
Poetic justice.
Why are you all surprised? Didn’t they say that ‘Malta taghna lkoll’?
Stick to making sandwiches, Astrid.
Astrid does not have a clue about the reasons why some properties remain vacant. One main reason is that the ownership of an inherited property is fragmented between thirty or more heirs who lead a busy and hectic life, and would not bother trying to get a few extra thousand Euros from coordinating everyone to have the property sold.
Another problem is that some properties can have specific lease contracts of casa-bottega, selling specific merchandise in the bottega and the casa is left uninhabited.