Bicycle Advocacy Group Rota has issued its reaction to the Labour Party proposal announced by Prime Minister Robert Abela on Thursday evening regarding vehicle upgrade grants for parents with three or more children.
Abela gave details of a new grant scheme for parents with three children or more, with a new Labour government pledging €5,000 towards the purchase of a larger vehicle and up to €12,000 if the vehicle is electric.
In a statement, Rota noted that ”everyone in Malta agrees that traffic is one of the country’s biggest problems.So why are we spending public money to make it worse?”
The group said that the Labour Party has announced grants of €5,000 for larger family cars and €12,000 if the vehicle is electric. ”At the same time, there is still little to no serious incentive for people to move away from car dependency, even though every person who chooses to walk, cycle or use public transport helps reduce congestion for everyone else.”
Rota warned that ”more cars, and bigger cars, are not going to solve Malta’s traffic and parking crisis. They will make it worse.”
The group said that larger vehicles ”take up more public space, create more pressure for on street parking and make streets more dangerous for children and pedestrians. Research [1] has shown that pedestrians hit by SUVs are significantly more likely to die than those hit by standard cars, especially children because of the higher bonnet design and larger blind spots [2].”
Studies [3] have also linked SUVs to higher rollover risks compared to normal passenger cars and are hence also more dangerous for those driving them, Rota said.
It insisted that ”both major parties need to stop treating traffic as a problem that can be solved with more lanes, more parking and more cars. We have tried that approach for years and congestion has only increased.”
Rota stressed that ”what Malta needs is investment in safer pavements, protected cycling infrastructure, better public transport and safer streets for children. We need a legally binding cycling strategy, stronger pedestrian protections such as presumed liability laws already used across Europe, and serious investment in active mobility.”
”Countries that reduced congestion did not do it by encouraging larger private vehicles. They did it by giving people real alternatives to needing a car for every trip,” said the group.
Rota concluded by saying that ”if we keep subsidising bigger cars while neglecting walking, cycling and public transport, we are simply paying to make Malta more congested, more dangerous and harder to live in.”
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