Finance Minister tells PN to withdraw ‘amateurish’ pre-budget document

Edward Scicluna shares his views on PN's pre-budget document • Video by Ray Attard

No proofreading, misleading statements, incorrect sourcing and mixing of figures is how the Finance Minister summed up the Nationalist Party’s pre-budget document.

In a press conference called to give his reactions to the PN document, Edward Scicluna expressed his “disbelief” in the “amateurish document which ridicules any party in Opposition”.

A “disappointed” Scicluna had a lot to say about mistakes in the various tables presented in the document, wrong presentation of figures and contradictory statements.

“It would be better for the PN if it were to withdraw its document, correct it and republish it. It’s replete with mistakes, amateurish and at times misleading. Tables are wrongly sourced, with missing figures or misplaced,” he said.

To start with, he pointed out, a pre-budget document meant for 2016 was titled ‘2015’; he questioned how a major political party also lacked the services of a proofreader.

Sticking to the financial side of his criticism, the finance minister said the PN had mixed the figures related to government consumption with figures on gross domestic product.

He lambasted what he called “a fixation” with government spending: “Figures clearly show that we are reducing deficit, which means that spending is under control. How can the Opposition hit out at our consumption when we are investing in free childcare centres, in health and in education?”

Criticising what he called an attempt “to warp the real picture”, Scicluna said it was evident that the PN had tried to manipulate figures and misrepresent the real situation. “For some reason they left out the increases in exports (net of fuel) in their international trade table and gave two different figures for registered unemployed.  They skipped the years which show an improvement in wholesale and retail trade and jumped from 2012 directly to 2015,” Scicluna said.

The finance minister said he could not understand why the PN had failed to include the increased participation of working women during 2015 and defended the government’s current decision not to further reduce energy bills.

Pressed by journalists, Scicluna said the PN was not credible in its calls: “They used to say we would bankrupt the country if we were to reduce bills; today they want further decreases. I can welcome suggestions from social partners but the PN is simply not consistent.”

Scicluna reiterated that the government was still paying off Enemalta's debts, interests and capital accumulated through the D1 project.

“Enemalta is in a period of convalescence … we have €320 million which can’t be rolled over,” he said.

Asked whether he could list at least three positive proposals, Scicluna said the government had received over 400 proposals from NGOs and social partners which it was considering.

The minister found himself in a quandary when he was repeatedly asked by reporters to present the number of doctors and educators employed with the public sector since 2013.

The Opposition has been insisting that the rising expenditure was partly due to excessive new jobs with the government. The government however insists that a lot of jobs were taken up by new workers within the health and education sectors.

“I am satisfied with the government expenditure because it is clear that deficit is under control. That is the most single important indicator,” Scicluna said, adding that the requested figures were available through the National Statistics Office.