The Ramblers’ Association has welcomed the government’s recently announced reform to suspend construction works while planning permits are under appeal.
Under the proposed system, the submission of an appeal would automatically suspend all rights arising from the contested permit, preventing demolition, excavation, construction, changes of use and other development works until the appeals process has been definitively concluded. The measure remains a proposal and must still pass through public consultation and Parliament before becoming law.
The Environment and Planning Review Tribunal would be required to hold its first hearing within 30 days and reach a decision within six months. Once the tribunal delivers its ruling, the parties would have 20 days to appeal before the Court of Appeal. The court would then have four months to deliver its judgment, with the possibility of a single two-month extension. The suspension of works would remain in force throughout both stages.
The Ramblers’ Association welcomed the proposal, saying that it would finally address the current regime under which developers can continue building while their permits are being challenged. Under the existing system, the appeals tribunal may suspend works, but it rarely does so, allowing entire developments to be completed before a Court ultimately declares their permits illegal.
The loophole has produced numerous cases in which developments were completed before their permits were revoked, after which developers submitted fresh applications to sanction what had already been built.
One of the most notorious examples concerns Joseph Portelli’s two massive swimming pools on outside-development-zone land in Qala. Excavation began without a permit in 2021, but the Planning Authority subsequently approved the development despite a recommendation for refusal. Portelli continued the works while objections moved through the appeals system, and both pools were completed before the Court of Appeal revoked their permit in March 2024 after finding that they breached the planning policies governing the area.
Joseph Portelli’s company later submitted a fresh application to sanction the two illegal pools, measuring approximately 414 and 267 square metres respectively. Similar tactics were used in Sannat, where penthouses and swimming pools linked to Portelli and his associates were completed before their permits were struck down by the Court of Appeal. The Planning Authority subsequently approved applications sanctioning several of the already-built penthouses despite the court’s judgment.
The reform would prevent developers from exploiting this dysfunction by ensuring that no contested permit can be used to create irreversible facts on the ground before residents, local councils and environmental organisations have exhausted their right of appeal.
Newsroom
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