PN's Gozo policy 'vindicated'

Gozo Minister Giovanna Debono said yesterday the Labour Party had finally realised that the Nationalist Party had been right all along in its policy on Gozo.

Mrs Debono was responding to Alfred Sant's announcement earlier in the day that Labour would retain a Gozo minister, a post it had abolished during its last stint in power.

"I am not surprised," said the minister of the new policy. "It appears that radical changes in policy, or better, U-turns, are a common occurrence with this party. The same happened on local councils and VAT, and who knows what other changes the MLP is planning?"

Addressing a press conference, Mrs Debono said the MLP had made no fresh proposals on Gozo. She went on to list a number of services that the Nationalist government had improved or was introducing in the island.

Among these were 13 new health services and a more modern hospital; the waste transfer station that would replace the Qortin landfill; a planned heritage park incorporating a golf course; refurbishment of 20 schools; the opening of an MCAST branch; and incentives in the industrial and agricultural sectors.

"Labour are simply repeating ideas for Gozo that this government has already implemented," she said.

"It seems clear that the Labour Party has two, completely different, electoral programmes. The official one; and thoughts not contained in it which are announced from time to time in news conferences."