Social partners given options on new power tariffs - increases expected

A Camilleri

Oct 1st 2008, 19:11

@ A Daley. I only heard labour saying we'll get Lm1.5 million (cash). Have you solved this mystery yet?

Jean Paul Galea

Oct 1st 2008, 19:09

This is a result of lack of foresight of the government whatever anyone says...when fuel was cheap we built energy hungry reverse osmosis and we didnt go for storing rain water... we didnt even build further efficient turbines for power station ... now that it is expensive we have to build them all at once at our expense. Investment in renewable energy should have been put 10 years ago.. fuel prices going up was inevitable all we had to do is plan for it...

albert critien

Oct 1st 2008, 18:51

presently the livelyhood of many is hanging on a flimsy thread, are the european law makers aware of wages earned by the maltese or are the maltese being made to subsidise the illegal immigrants. Our people in government should be firm with the europeans and not not be responsible for a considerable loss in the number of our population.

C. Scerri

Oct 1st 2008, 18:13

The problem is that we are paying for around 40000 households that do not pay the surcharge and neither will they pay the higher bills!!

l Galea

Oct 1st 2008, 17:42

@J Farugiia
What is crazy is that the Government has been warned about the situation years ago and yet no attempt was made to turn to other sources of renewable energy.

We are blessed with great amounts of sunshine and wind nearly all the year round.

If I remember correctly, we are the second or third place with the most sunshine days in the world.

Yet, what did our Government do to shift to other methods of energy production? Nothing, nada, zero.

To cap it all anyone wanting to install photovoltaic panels and other renewable energy sources still has to pay taxes on a very substantial investment which will not or maybe just pay back for itself over its estimated lifetime.

How about the Government at least removing tax on such products to reduce our oil imports and also help the environment?

Joseph Cilia

Oct 1st 2008, 17:37

As usual people expect to get subsidies for everything, thinking that these are being given for free, but nothing comes for free. We better start looking at the reality, subsidies are paid out of our taxes, hence we are paying for the subsidies we get anyway.

If we look at the whole picture, if subsidies are removed from power bills, in theory Gov would have less expenses, hence could tax less. End result, nothing really changes.

Michael Cutajar

Oct 1st 2008, 17:31

@Anita Giusti

You are wrong Anita. You should have said "THE GENERAL ELECTION IS OVER"

flimkien kollox possibbli indeed!!

Paul Borg

Oct 1st 2008, 17:15

We Love you GONZI . . . We do.

Gonzi is doing what is best for Malta.

anita giusti

Oct 1st 2008, 16:35

the fiesta is over in Malta! It's time to pay for what we use...

A Daley

Oct 1st 2008, 16:32

Here we go again.

Why is the Government not keeping it's word?

Aaahhh - the EU.

The I don't know how many million dollar question from the EU. That was the only important thing then.

Because the EU does not allow subsidies.

Waow, is that so?

You never mentioned this prior to joining the EU, did you?

Lies and deceit at their best, or is it at their worse!

So what happens when the EU money dries up after 2013?

Has anyone ever heard PN state the amount of millions of Euros we are paying back to the EU?

No, and you'll never hear it either.

You see, it's a mystery.

l Galea

Oct 1st 2008, 16:24

@Fleur Vella
if the eu allowed subsidizing to the end consumer then it would not have insisted that the minimum tax as established by its regulations and directives has to be applied.

While it may just be possible in the case of private consumers but certainly not below the cost price + the minimum tax, this will certainly not apply to commercial operators.

Any part subsidized to commercial operators will be considered as being unlawful state aid as it will put them in a more favourable position with respect to their competitors. That includes other operators in other member countries as well for the eu is considered as a single market.

It is good to point out that the Government was only granted the permission after begging the Commission to charge a lower VAT on electricity services because our electricity grid is small and isolated and was considered not to impact the european grid operators.

If we are connected to the european grid then we will no longer be isolated with the attendant consequence of paying full VAT.

This is another effect of joining the eu that was hidden from the people.

J Farugiia

Oct 1st 2008, 16:22

Are these crazy? Has anyone watched the RAI News yesterday announcing the latest 'stangata' for the italian people regarding petrol prices, water and electricity bills, etc.
Don't tell me that we dont care for what happens abroad. We are a part of the globalised world. And what we feel is what other people feel. And this is reality not fiction. Irrespective of political creeds this is a situation which NO ONE, I repeat no one will ever find a solution to a problem of this magnitude. And it will hurt. As much as illegal immigration.

anthony cassar

Oct 1st 2008, 15:52

i think that the most just way is to charge those that waste most.
the more one wastes the more he pays.
at least the basic needs should be charged at the minimum possible.

F J Brincat

Oct 1st 2008, 15:41

Oh great. Right now, this is just what we need. I’m not saying that the government should keep on subsidizing the water bills, but I’m sure that there must have been some better times when the subsidies could have been reduced bit by bit.

As it is, it is a case of too much and all at once. At some point in time, this had to happen, but it has happened at an ugly point in time.

I guess that there isn’t a lot of chance of the money saved in subsidies by the government , being transformed in some sort of temporary tax rebates for the lower-bracket wage earners (and by that I mean those who earn between EUR 8000 –EUR 14000) eh?

Mark Piscopo

Oct 1st 2008, 15:35

If the governments implements these new power tarriffs, all maltese people will suffer drastically.

Fleur Vella

Oct 1st 2008, 15:15

Where is it written that Government cannot subsidize consumers? As far as I know EU rules allow subsidisaiton to the final consumer.