Muscat says government ‘on right side of history’

The Prime Minister Joseph Muscat appealed to Labour Party supporters to go out and vote for the party’s candidates in the upcoming MEP elections, during his address at a political gathering in Attard.

Citing government’s performance throughout the past year as ‘historic’ - whereby electoral promises such as the reduction in energy tariffs, the introduction of free childcare services, and the reimbursement of VAT on registered cars purchased between 2004 and 2008, were kept to - Muscat said that the Labour movement was “making Malta more European”.

“Our aim is to make Malta the land of opportunity, equality and innovation,” he bellowed out amidst applause from the congregation of Labourites.

Muscat started off his discourse by thanking all the medical personnel, including ophthalmologist and former parliamentary secretary Franco Mercieca, for tending to him during the past week. During a similar Labour activity last week, the prime minister’s eye vision was impaired due to faulty ultraviolet lighting.

The PM said that it had already been nearly a month since the energy tariffs had been reduced and that families across Malta and Gozo will, in the near future, be receiving letters by post in which the percentage saved will be fully explained. He also said that government will be creating an application, accessible through smart phones and iPads, for the same purpose.

Describing the tariff reduction as government’s “prime promise” during the general election campaign, Muscat said that its implementation served as “a big victory both for the government, as well as for all those people who had faith in a change, and improvement, in government” last year.

“It must be kept in mind that, with others in power, these tariffs would not only have not decreased, but they would have been raised,” he said, referring to the Opposition.

Muscat said that with such schemes, people will have more money in their pockets and would be able to make better use of it by investing in their own lives and their children’s.  This, in turn, will help to generate more jobs and help economic growth.

The prime minister said the rate of Malta’s economic growth was better than that of Europe’s, but that it was government’s job to ensure that more job vacancies were always being created.  One example of this, he said, came in the form of a recent agreement between government and ARMS, through which contract conditions were improved and extended.

In the past year alone, he said that more than 5000 jobs had been created but that half of these were taken up by foreigners.

“Are we happy about this?” he said, “Certainly not. Ultimately, our priority is to make sure that the bulk of these jobs are taken up by Maltese and Gozitans.”

Muscat said that government was committed to helping persons find employment, but said that the current system of registration allowed for persons to apply for jobs that were not available.

“People tell me that they cannot find a job, and then I have employers telling me that they cannot find employees,” he said.

“This government will keep on striving to find work for the very last remaining unemployed person,” he claimed.

Citing government’s stand on divorce and civil unions as placing the Labour Party on “the right side of history”, Muscat attacked the Opposition and its leader, Simon Busuttil, for not being vocal about their position on adoption by gay couples.

“How can they not make their position clear on such a big issue?”

Muscat, who described Busuttil as lacking credibility and political direction, said that the government was behind the law, which will be debated in parliament tomorrow.

Describing the Labour movement as ‘progressive and liberal’, Muscat said that he did not enter politics for the prestige that came with it, but rather to be able to contribute positively towards Malta’s history.

Born into a family with mixed political ideologies, the PM said that he chose to support the Labour Party on the basis of their past achievements, which tallied with his own values.

“There are those that simply use scare-mongering tactics and then there are those who sincerely want to better the country,” he said.

“We are truly making ‘Malta Taghna Lkoll’ (Malta belongs to us all) and it for this reason that I entered politics.”

Muscat also extended his congratulations to the Malta water polo team for finishing in second place at the Commonwealth Championship, after losing out to England 16-9 in yesterday’s final.