Standards Committee Agrees To Reprimand Rosianne Cutajar Over Yorgen Fenech Property Deal Ethics Breach
Parliament’s Committee for Standards in Public Life has agreed to reprimand Labour MP Rosianne Cutajar over her failure to declare income from a property deal in her declaration of assets.
An investigation into the allegation by the Standards Commissioner was concluded in July and found that the MP had in fact breached ethics when she failed to declare brokerage fees received from the deal.
Despite the commissioner’s investigation, it must be Parliament that has the final say on an investigation, with Labour MPs Glenn Bedingfield and Edward Zammit Lewis, who both sit on the committee, having so far refused to accept the investigation’s conclusion, insisting instead that further investigation was required.
The committee has since heard from the Tax Commissioner among others and agreed last week to accept the findings of the commissioner’s investigation.
It however shot down a motion by the Opposition for Cutajar to be suspended from Parliament.
Testifying before the committee today, the MP said she was unaware that she needed to declare gifts she had received, insisting that she had never received anything in order for her to help anyone out politically.
Nationalist MP Therese Comodini Cachia said she would have expected Cutajar to go before the committee and acknowledge her wrongdoing, rather than continue to defend her position by saying the money was “a gift, a birthday present”.
Comodini Cachia said Cutajar did not deserve to be given the benefit of the doubt given that she had no respect for Parliament.
The committee agreed to reprimand Cutajar in a vote, however a request for the wording of the reprimand to be divulged before the vote was denied.
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