PM calls for people's sense of adventure

The Nationalist Party had to remain focused on its agenda and be open to everyone, while retaining its strong values, Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi said yesterday.

In the same breath, he appealed to the Maltese to "awaken their sense of adventure" in the two-year run-up to the general election so the country could provide and take advantage of the golden opportunities ahead.

Dr Gonzi was delivering the closing address of the PN's general council, with the theme Inkomplu niggeddu flimkien... biex int tghix ahjar (Let's continue renewing together ... so you may lead a better life), held at the San Lawrenz Hotel, in Gozo.

Dr Gonzi said the secret of the PN's success lay in the fact that it was a popular party and insisted that it needed to continue opening its arms to everyone and listening to the people.

It was for this reason that representatives of five "outsider" organisations were invited to address the general council and air their views, Dr Gonzi said, pointing out that the youths section of the General Workers' Union had, however, declined the invitation to attend and express its opinions.

By the 2008 general election, following the efforts put in over the past years, restructuring problems would be overcome and the ground covered would mean that it would be plain sailing, Dr Gonzi said.

Over the next two years, the government would be focusing on pension, port and education reforms and will also ensure that the €800 million from the EU would be put to good use.

The road ahead would not be void of obstacles, but Dr Gonzi was confident they would be overcome. As regards education, the government was committed to ensuring that youths - particularly Gozitans, who faced more complications - continued to pursue their university studies, Dr Gonzi said, adding that the government was reducing the deficit and saving money to be able to spend it on students.

He expressed his pleasure that, over the last four years, the majority of university graduates was female, creating a new generation of qualified women.

Gozo was a model of renewal and also of the problems that come with it, Dr Gonzi said, referring to the roads that were being improved on the island.

It was chosen not as a hideaway, as the Labour Party had maintained, but because it was an integral part of the PN's economic, environment and social policies.

In the case of tourism, issues of accessibility had to be addressed, while the business community in Gozo faced complicated challenges in view of its double insularity.

Dr Gonzi said the government had passed on to the MLP proposals to amend the Constitution to consider Gozo as a region for election purposes. It was awaiting the MLP's reaction, he said. The PN was a "pioneer of change" that led the country forward and performed best in stormy situations, fighting against the current and sticking to its direction to reach port.

While Opposition Leader Alfred Sant had effectively introduced a "500-per-cent surcharge" when he doubled the electricity tariffs during his short stint in power, the government was itself carrying Lm20 million of the fuel surcharge burden, he said.

Dr Gonzi commented on the "amateur way" in which the MLP was dealing with issues such as the pensions reform, which has been discussed for years and on which the MLP has commissioned a report to be drawn up in two months time.

Dr Gonzi questioned how Dr Sant could be allowed to get away with it, pointing out that the pensions reform was one of the most determining factors of the future.

The Prime Minister also referred to the recent local council elections, saying the results had to be understood in the context of renewal the country was going through.

It was not advisable that the government treated the local elections like general elections and, for five consecutive years, embarked on campaigns to win them, pushing aside the main issues that had to be tackled.

"Local council elections are local council elections," Dr Gonzi insisted, and it would not be acting in a politically responsible manner to equate them with general elections and change agendas accordingly, or stop the country every year to serve its partisan interests.

Former Labour activist Joe Camilleri, now a member on the PN general council, said he had been threatened after he delivered his speech on Saturday.