PN must axe CEO over role in Mater Dei concrete ‘scandal,’ minister insists

Health Minister Konrad Mizzi insisted that the position of PN CEO Brian St John was no longer tenable due to his involvement in the signing of an agreement granting a waiver to Swedish contractors Skanska and its Maltese partner Blokrete over any claims concerning Mater Dei Hospital.

This waiver, revealed by Mater Dei Hospital, may include any claims which could be made over the use of inferior quality concrete, which the government estimates will cost at least €35 million – and up to €50 million once tests are concluded – to address. The government, however, is seeking legal advice to determine whether it may still seek compensation for what both Dr Mizzi and Parliamentary Secretary for Health Chris Fearne described as outright theft.

At a hastily-announced press conference – journalists were given just 30 minutes notice – held at the Health Ministry yesterday afternoon, Dr Mizzi insisted that members of the last PN-led cabinet – the agreement including the waiver was signed in 2009 – should assume responsibility over the case, as should the party’s present leader Simon Busuttil. When pressed on the matter, he said that even former EU Commissioner John Dalli – who was health minister at the time, and who was appointed as an advisor on public health reform by the present government – should assume responsibility.

Mr Fearne said that the weak concrete found at the Emergency Department was laid in the first half of 1996, when the PN was still in government, and also clarified that the original contract relating to the construction of Mater Dei Hospital specified that the hospital structure had to be able to support additional floors should they be deemed necessary.

On his part, Dr Mizzi said that the structural deficiencies were revealed when the government was set to build an additional floor over the department to increase the number of beds within the hospital.

Mr Fearne also noted that ARUP, the international company who tested the concrete at Mater Dei, highlighted that the procedures to test the strength of concrete have remained unchanged for decades, and that there was no way for those involved not to know that the strength of the concrete used was not up to standard.

ARUP also highlighted, he added, that it had never found such obvious structural deficiencies in a public structure within any developed country, although it did find similar issues in undeveloped nations.

Dr Mizzi said that the waiver was included, “out of the blue” in a project closure agreement, through which the Foundation for Medical Services, Skanska and Blokrete agreed to settle various pending matters.

He noted that media reports highlighted that Mr St John and Paul Camilleri – who were FMS acting CEO and chairman respectively at the time – had been responsible for drawing up the agreement, although he also clarified that members of the cabinet at the time confirmed that the matter made it to cabinet.

The minister thus said that he had a number of questions to make, asking the members of that cabinet why they approved such a waiver, and whether they had acted on the advice of the Attorney General.

He also said that he specifically wanted to ask questions to former Health Minister Joe Cassar – as well as MP Claudette Buttigieg, who had served as his spokesperson for a period of time – and to former Finance Minister Tonio Fenech, who chaired the Mater Dei Hospital steering committee.

But he also insisted that Mr St John, who left FMS to become the CEO of the PN’s media and commercial arm, Media.Link, last year, had a lot to answer for, before accusing the PN of applying two weights and two measures for failing to act against its CEO. He pointed out that the former ministers who were found to have secret Swiss bank accounts had been suspended from the party “in 10 minutes.”

Yesterday morning, Mr St John filed a judicial protest asking Dr Mizzi and Prime Minister Joseph Muscat to retract their position on the matter, but when asked on this development, Dr Mizzi stuck to his guns, stating that it was Mr St John who had to apologise to the nation for his role in the theft.

...it had never found such obvious structural deficiencies in a public structure within any developed country, although it did find similar issues in undeveloped nations