Statement by the President that will be presented to the EGM this afternoon. Shortly after the new Committee was elected, we approached the Government to advise them of the different issues that we felt they needed to act on urgently. These were basically

1. The sale or otherwise of the Empty Berths at the Marina and

2. The implementation of the Small Vessels Advisory Board which board would have members of our Marina and would act as a watchdog on the Port and help sort out the many internal issues which the Marina issued daily.

We had a meeting with the Patron of the Marina, the Chief Minister, who we advised of this, particularly expressing our concern that the fact that the berths had not been allocated was creating a lessening of our income and its repercussions. It also meant that the promise that the Marina would be used for the betterment of the Sea lovers in Gibraltar now meant nothing, when the waiting list had not moved since the Government took this decision some years ago. The CM advised us that a steering committee would be formed in September 2024 in which these matters, particularly the future of the berths, would be discussed. When contacted in September, he advised us that this had now been taken over by the Minister for the Port and asked her to meet us. This we did in October 24, wherein Minister Gemma Arias, confirmed that she had been tasked by the CM with this and that she would deal with this ASAP. In fact, she advised us that the Advisory Board would be put in place shortly and this would be one of the sounding boards for the new policy on Empty Berths.

Over 2025 , and having identified the various problems that we had in the Marina, we expected to have the advisory board created where we could discuss these issues e.g. Berth mismatches. No advisory board was created and in fact a moratorium was set by the Government on the issue of empty berths, so basically any berth remaining empty, would NOT be allocated by the Port with the consequent lack of funds for the Marina. Members would have noted that we have put some £30,000 as the monies which the Marina have less given the empty berths. We did in fact send an invoice to the Port for the cost at £365 of each empty berth but they have not honoured this invoice. We now have some 75 empty berths ranging from a loss of approx. £35,000 for the coming year.

We eventually met the Minister a couple of months ago. She understood our issues and promised to give us some steer on the Government decisions on empty berths going forward and on the creation of the Advisory Board. She understood that we had an EGM at the end of October and promised to give us something before that date so that we could give to our members.

We have to report that no such statement has been made, and we believe that the Government does not take us seriously. This Committee will not stand for the Government issuing empty promises to us and expects it to find the time necessary to finally decide on the way forward for the Marina. It should also give the Marina the presence in any board that gives us the right to decide on how our Marina is run. The Committee spent hours working on the betterment of the Marina, only to find that the port play lip service to us, in the main ignoring many issues and not acting on others. After many meetings, we have finally got the Port to accept a transfer policy for members but even this they do wrong and in many instances ignoring our recommendations. This lack of attention by the Government in its ministerial capacities and in the CoP in his legal duties is unacceptable.

As a Committee, we do not know how we tackle this issue and would like to hear members’ thoughts about this.

The question is “HOW WOULD MEMBERS LIKE THE COMMITTEE TO TACKLE THE LACK OF ACTION BY THE GOVERNMENT AND THE LOSS OF INCOME RESULTING FROM THIS CARELESS ATTITUDE”.