Mangion wants truth on electricity subsidies

In the first nine months of this year the government would have forked out €58.4 million in subsidies to Enemalta, 36 per cent more than figures previously mentioned by the government, Opposition leader Charles Mangion said yesterday.

He called on Finance Minister Tonio Fenech to publish the subsidies handed out by the government in the first six months last year and this year as well as the subsidies handed out throughout all last year and the prediction for this year.

On Tuesday Dr Mangion has asked for the truth to emerge as to why the government retained the water and electricity surcharge at 50 per cent in the first six months of the year.

Dr Mangion claimed that Infrastructure Minister Austin Gatt and Finance Minister Tonio Fenech were differing over the reason for the surcharge being kept at that level between January and June.

He said that while Dr Gatt had said in November that Enemalta had been in a position to retain the surcharge at 50 per cent up to June because of hedging agreements, in a statement last week Mr Fenech said that the government had passed on €37 million to Enemalta in subsidies for the surcharge to be retained at 50 per cent.

Dr Mangion argued that if the hedging agreements which Dr Gatt had boasted about tallied with the budget estimates, there would have been no need to pay €37 million to Enemalta.

He added that this situation was creating doubts about the hedging and about how professional the budget estimates were for this year.

In a counter statement, Dr Gatt said there was no inconsistency in the remarks which he and Minister Fenech had made about the surcharge. He said the surcharge was held at 50 per cent between January and June this year because Enemalta had purchased oil thoughtfully and because of the subsidies the government passed on to the corporation.