IT-TLETTAX-IL LEĠIŻLATURA P.L. 8 Dokument Imqiegħed Fuq Il-Mejda
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IT-TLETTAX-IL LEĠIŻLATURA P.L. 8 Dokument imqiegħed fuq il-Mejda tal-Kamra tad-Deputati fis-Seduta Numru 2 tas-26 ta’ Ġunju 2017 mill-Ispeaker, l-Onor. Anġlu Farrugia. ___________________________ Raymond Scicluna Skrivan tal-Kamra 47th British Islands and Mediterranean Region Conference 21 - 24 May 2017 Gibraltar Hon Anglu Farrugia, Speaker Hon Godfrey Farrugia, MP Parliamentary Delegation Report to the House of Representatives. Date: 21 - 24 May 2017 Venue: Gibraltar Maltese delegation: Honourable Anglu Farrugia M.P., President of the House of Representatives, Dr. Godfrey Farrugia (Former Government Whip) Programme: At the invitation of the Gibraltar CPA Branch, the Speaker of the House of Representatives and Chairperson of the CPA Small Branches, attended the 47th British Islands and Mediterranean Region (BIMR) Annual Conference. Report drawn by the Speaker. Participation of Speaker Honourable An{)lu Farrugia at the BIMR Annual Conference. The 47th British Islands and Mediterranean Region (BIMR) Conference was held in Gibraltar between the 21st and the 24th of May 2017. As Chairperson of the Small Branches of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association, I was invited to attend and participate in this conference and on the session of Monday, 22nd May 2017, I chaired the Plenary Session 2 with regard to the role of Small Branches. Among the speakers, there was Hon. Geoffrey Boot from the Isle of Man. I also participated in the only workshop that took place after the plenary session on Tuesday, 23'd May 2017, with regard to the effect of Brexit on different communities in the region. In fact, besides being Chair during this workshop, I made my own keynote speech with regard to this workshop where I referred to various cases to the members of the BIMR, such as the main industry being tourism, as being an important industry where in some cases it amounts to 10% to 15% of the GDP and that the majority of tourists came from the UK and other EU member states. I mentioned this point in order to stress how important it is that the solidarity between the countries and the branches in this region should continue to be close, notwithstanding the effect of Brexit I referred also to the most acute impact of open borders that may be felt by the branches of this region were in discussions about borders including the bringing up of long line contentions according to sovereignty. In fact, I also referred to the case of Spain calling for co-sovereignty over Gibraltar where some say that Brexit may also rekindle Argentines claim over the Falkland Islands, . which are also members of this region. It seems that all of the BIMR members need to articulate their own relationship with UK or the EU, as applicable. In this session we also discussed the specifications of our region with a view to continue the relationship afforded to us, to our common past, and retain the commonwealth to increase mutual open borders, not only by increasing the movement of holiday makers but also of workers. In fact, in the case of Gibraltar the work force comprises of over 12,000 people who commute daily from Spain specifically for employment The Deputy Andrew Lewis of Jersey, the Attorney General of Gibraltar, Michael Llamas, and Hon. Joyce Watson of Wales also addressed this workshop. During the Plenary Session 3, the effect of Brexit on the region and turning to the Commonwealth post-Brexit well discussed. The main speaker was the Deputy Chief Minister of Gibraltar, Hon. Dr Joseph Garcia, who spoke about Brexit and Gibraltar. He also answered questions and in one of my observations with regard to the case of Gibraltar, I referred to the citizens' rights post-Brexit In fact I stated that several members of parliament of the European Union reiterated their major concern not only over the three million European citizens in the UK, who are uncertain about the rights after March 2019, being the theoretical date for the UK to leave the EU, but also of British citizens in the European Union who amount to more than 1.2 million and that I I the European Parliament has already received over 7,000 letters on the subject where the third category of the individuals should be taken into account I also mentioned the position of the chief negotiator of the EU, Michel Barnier, who said that, "We first need to tackle the rights of the citizens and the orderly withdrawal of the United Kingdom.", at the State of the Union Conference, organised by the European University Institute of Florence, he also stated "that it is also a political necessity. We will not discuss our future relationship with UK until the 27 member states are reassured that all citizens will be treated properly and humanely, otherwise there can be no trust when it comes to constructing a new relationship with the UK." Thus, I did ask the Deputy Chief Minister, who is also the Minister of Gibraltar for Brexit, whether he considers that, if the Gibraltarians are being discriminated by the EU with regard to the rights that they enjoyed before the Brexit, in order to protect the same rights post-Brexit he would consider to take the case before the European Court of Justice to seek redress. I also asked him this question since the Court of Justice of the EU is the competent court on the interpretation of these rights in the event of conflicts and that is out of question to create a new body to replace the court. Since Gibraltar became a member of the EU together with the UK in 1973 and due to the fact that last year 96% of the Gibraltarians voted in a separate referendum and decided that they should remain in the EU, I asked whether Gibraltar would consider to take the matter before the European Court of Justice to consider their position as continuing on being members of the EU once the reverse was done in the case of Greenland and Andorra years before. I also said that the fact that they would not be given that right meant that it could also be interpreted as discriminatory application of the EU position with regard to Gibraltar. Dr Garcia said that all options would be taken into consideration. The conference ended on Tuesday evening where we discussed the reports of the workshop that I chaired as well as the Steering Committee of the Commonwealth Women Parliamentarians, including the minutes of the General Assembly of the BIMR, which took place during the session of Monday morning. Hon. Godfrey Farrugia, former Government Whip, accompanied me during this conference and he also participated in the workshop on Brexit I also participated in various interviews; one with the daily newspaper Gibraltar Panorama, and one with the main Gibraltar television stations where I was interviewed about this conference and about the historical attachment between Malta and Gibraltar, in particular to the Maltese community and the Maltese surnames that are found in the Gibraltarian population which amount to about one third of the population, that is 11 ,000 out of 33,000. i Speaker of the House of Representatives interviewed by Gibraltarian newspaper, THE PANORAMA. What do you think of the Conference? Malta is one the members of the BIMR, which includes the member states of the Commonwealth within the Mediterranean and other countries like the Falkland Islands, St. Helena etc. That also includes England, as being part of the British Island Mediterranean Region. The Conference is being organized by the Gibraltar branch and we accepted the invitation. I accepted the invitation also because I am going to chair two of the sessions. What is your opinion of Gibraltar in the current changing circumstances? Malta is still in EU; do you feel like Gibraltar would be disadvantaged for being out of the EU with Britain? It is not a question of being at a disadvantage or not, it is the existence of the realities. We have the Brexit effect and we still have to wait for the discussions of the exit process, which could take more than two or three years. Malta and Cyprus are the only EU members who are also part of the BIMR. It is quite interesting, at parliamentary level, to have this discussion on the post-Brexit with regards to Gibraltar and other oversea territories that are going to be effected because of the Brexit. How do you see the relations between Gibraltar and Malta? We obviously have this sort of familiar relationship in terms of so many routes of Gibraltarians? Yes! I know that about one third of your population have Maltese surnames. Yes, my surname is Mifsud! Mifsud is very popular in Malta. We are very conscious about that and we are very proud that quite a substantial part of the Gibraltarian population is of Maltese breed. This make the Gibraltarian population quite interesting because it is mainly Maltese, Genoese, Jewish and also Moroccan and Spanish. It is a mix of these populations. Malta is relatively becoming like that because although our population is nearly half a million, over 400,000, we do have quite a large number of foreigners who are settling in Malta. This is happening for many reasons but mostly because of the economic boom. As you know, Malta is second with regard to economic growth in the EU and it is the second in the Euro Zone as well. Therefore, we have many foreigners coming over to our island, also because the Maltese employment force is not enough. I know that you have the same situation and you have a lot of Spanish crossing the border to come to work.