Je Suis Marie Antoinette: 4,000 euros to air-condition Muscat’s two-hour cabinet meeting in Gozo
Chris Said, the shadow minister for Gozo, asked the prime minister in parliament how much his cabinet meeting in Gozo, last July, had cost the taxpayer.
I rather suspect Said’s question was triggered by a story on this website, three weeks ago, about the elaborate and preparations for that meeting, and the money that must have been squandered.
The total cost of that meeting, the prime minister replied this evening, was €6,827.95: €2,950 for air-conditioning services + €992.85 for “the installation and dismantling of the required equipment” (which means some €4,000 for air-conditioning alone), €1,893.90 for renting a screen, and €991.20 for the transport, installation and removal of the special conference table used for televisual effect.
Nothing was said about other costs I remarked on in my post: the cost of ferrying a cabinet of 20+ to Gozo each in their individual chauffeured cars (petrol and so on) and the cost of the lunch some of them stayed on for afterwards, unless they paid for this themselves. And let’s hope none of them used a military helicopter to get there and back.
Picture shows the temporary airconditioning system being rigged up to cool the top floor at the Gozo school where Muscat held a cabinet meeting last July. it cost 4,000 euros.
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I never liked over baked gingerbread men, so its good that they kept them at the right oven mark.
Not blocking Twitter users is cheaper.
Minn fuq dahar il-poplu.
Le, kollox mill-paga tieghu hallas.
And then they are being miserly about the garden in city ditch.
And if classrooms in a school are hot enough to require air-conditioning for Malta’s finest, then how is it not required for school children and teachers? School term runs into late June, of not the beginning of July as well.
Veru hniezer. Renting a conference room in a hotel would have been way, way, way cheaper. They gave the impression they were doing it on the cheap jahasra. Sploda f’wicchom.
And in the meantime, did they rent out the cabinet office at the Auberge de Castille to get some compensation money? Or was it being used for a High Tea for the High Society?
Well, you should ask that question to Miao Shell… Dik tiddeletta bit-tejatrini.
And just across the road!
You got it all wrong. The yellow things are in fact rubbish chutes. Short cut to the skip. However I fear some cabinet members would have got stuck in it.
Where is the ‘Like’ button for this comment?
How did politicians manage to have meetings in the 1950s or 1960s or earlier?
Did they manage to cool the air by tobacco smoke and meeting in buildings with windows that open?
Can you imagine Joseph Howard or Injazju Panzavecchia doing this?
Il-vera worthed (sic)
A meeting held at the Paris Hilton would have been cheaper.
I doubt Paris Hilton would have them.
A total of Eur7,000 for an excursion to Gozo. The prime minister rents his car to the government for one year for that amount of money.
How about inserting a LIKE button after some/every comment as I’m sure some comments will hit the ceiling with Likes. But be careful as you may be sued by Facebook.
Elfejn euro fis-siegha biex jivventila kuxxtejh ma jmurx jixxawwat.
U ghall-haddiema 58 centezmu fil-gimgha biex jieklu.
Definizzjoni perfetta ta’ socjalizmu
Jaqta l-hela qal meta kien fl-oppozizzjoni. Fil-gvern jara kif jivvintha. Jew aktar probabbli, jara kif jivvintha dhul generuz ghal xi tnejn tal-qalba jew li ghandu obligazzjoni lejhom.
With perhaps €800 the parliamentary group could have booked a hall at one of Gozo’s hotels (ready air-conditioned) and had some canapes and prosecco served during the break.
Giving a princely €4000 gift to friends (we know who the beneficiaries were) smells of corruption.
Why did they have to hire air-handling units, chillers, ducts, generators with fuel and a table when they could have had the same facilities plus a carpeted floor and perfumed toilets for far less?
Did this expense add value to their decisions? And where was the Minister of Finance in all this? I expect the Auditor General to raise this in his annual report.
What a shame.
[Daphne – They held it in a state school to look like they were being thrifty by not having it in a hotel. It never occurred to them that somebody might photograph all the rented equipment outside and that questions would be asked.]
Does the PM not understand the meaning of the word ‘total’ then? Or is this his way of not answering a question while giving the impression that he was giving an answer? Surely he would not lie deliberately would he?
It’s roughly 40km from Valletta to the venue in Gozo, one way. Therefore each car travelled around an extra 100km. Drivers had to be engaged for at least an extra 2.5hrs each. Did the Ministers carpool?
One hopes that next time, before someone gets a similar bright idea, the PM would have had the wisdom to look up what ‘total cost’ means and refrain from short-changing the tax payer. Of course, those who laughed all the way to the bank after the event, might not agree with me and would prefer the PM to continue to dig his heals in.
And in the meantime over at AirMalta: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pFjVbiPzwpI
€1,900 for renting a screen!
Eur4,000 biex joqghodu jivventilaw.
It would be interesting to get to know from whom the AC equipment,screen etc were hired.
Dear Daphne, I am amazed at how you did not comment on the price of oil and how here in Malta it is daylight robbery in petrol and diesel prices.
The great unwashed do not understand that what we saved from electricity and water (25% and 5 %) have been eaten away by what we are paying more for fuel.
The PM said he will make us the best in Europe (sic) but all Europeans are paying less than what they paid before.
We all remember the farce of a press conference when the PM announced that petrol will cost 2c less. Since then the price has been spiraling down and down – but not in Malta.
If we are not being robbed then those ‘consultants, experts who are made up of ex ONE employees, billboard stars and for being Labour have made another fu…k up.
They must have made a big fu*k up with hedging. A bunch of incompetents who think they are the experts – same as Mintoff when he lost Malta several millions of liras by doing the FX deals at the Central Bank.
http://daphnecaruanagalizia.com/2014/12/other-peoples-money-no-problem-how-the-government-slashes-the-deficit/
Someone ripped them off. I used a similar aircon service for under 1000 euros a day including installation.
L O L @ supplier of equipment! It’s one of the inner Taghna Lkoll members, and it’s not just the renting of mobile A/Cs.
Truly, what difference would it make if the meeting was held at Castille?
Fl-entitajiet tal-gvern l-overtime kollu barra u flus salvati qed jikluhom il-konsulenti mal-istess entititajiet
What? No food? Refreshments? Open sandwiches etc? Where are those costs?
Perhaps they had a bread roll and water brought over to them from Air Malta.
It seems to me that one item appearing regularly on Joseph Muscat’s agenda for cabinet meetings is: what are we doing next to give that blogger without a name something to write about?
The main purpose of this is to keep people’s attention from focussing on more important items, like John Dalli, Paul Sheehen, Helena Dalli, the votes misplaced in the last general election, Silvio Schembri, ministers’ travel expenses, the price of fuel, the situation at Mater Dei, etc.
There are so many that it would need a telephone-directory-sized book to set the all down in writing.
Can they get more ridiculous in their thinking and erratic, irresponsible decision making?
They could always wrap themselves in bacon rind and sing Bohemian Rhapsody in falsetto. But they’re getting there.
Hallas poplu …u baxxi rasek …ghax iduru l-lpup ghalik. Viva Malta taghhom lkoll. Malta miskina.
With €4000 he could have installed fixed air conditioners in the classroom for pupils to enjoy.