– Roberta Metsola Tedesco Triccas

Nationalist candidate Roberta Metsola Tedesco Triccas has criticised the Labour Opposition for refusing pairing for Thursday's parliamentary sitting, insisting that the national interest had to come first.

Disagreement over pairing meant that Malta could not be represented at an urgent EU Health Ministers' meeting on the swine flu outbreak

"At the same time as the EU and the other 26 Member States are meeting to discuss measures to combat the danger posed by the spread of this disease, the Labour Opposition has chosen to manoeuvre so that Malta would be forced to be absent from this important exercise in European co-operation and solidarity, she added.

Addressing a press conference this morning, the PN candidate explained how the decision to call an urgent meeting of the Council of Ministers of Health showed how the EU believed in the crucial role that it has in taking immediate action in circumstances such as these that was intended to tackle the outbreak of the disease that started in Mexico but has reportedly already spread to European countries.

This decision showed just how much Labour and its leadership were incapable of understanding what the duty of members of the Government were in a situation where every other EU country were doing their utmost to decide upon a plan of action to tackle Swine Flu.