Chris Said to lead new PN facebook initiative

Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi this afternoon renewed his appeal for the Nationalist Party to speak to the people, listen to them and show them esteem.

Speaking at the end of a meeting of the PN general council, Dr Gonzi focused on the party's beliefs and avoided reference to current controversies in parliament other than to thank Home Affairs Minister Carm Mifsud Bonnici, who spoke earlier. He said the minister's speech, like his writings, showed his integrity, seriousness and his strong sense of duty to the country. "That is why we have every confidence in him," Dr Gonzi said.

He said that the PN's policies were motivated by a sense of service. The question which the party had to ask itself was how it could do more for the people. "We are working every day to provide solutions and to give every individual a future," Dr Gonzi said.

He listed initiatives by the government for the workers, the self-employed, farmers, working women, business and other sectors.

The Labour Party, he said,  had a history of being wrong when faced with major decisions which the country needed to take, including independence and EU membership, but also other issues such as that of Church schools.

The most recent Labour government had also not been able to keep its word on many issues such as the stipends given to students.

Dr Gonzi said the series of meetings which the PN launched a few months ago were making good progress and had brought politics down to a lower level. The mychoice.pn initiative had also been an unqualified success and following a suggestion by one of the users, Benjamin Camilleri, it would now be extended to facebook with myvoice.pn, providing people with a direct link to him, the ministers and the party, Dr Gonzi said. This was a tool were everyone should use to make their suggestions and even criticism, he said. Justice and Public Dialogue Minister Chris Said would coordinate this initiative and ensure that the conversation grew and the PN could absorb the ideas that were made.

"We need to work hard in order to win, let us not be carried away by enthusiasm," Dr Gonzi warned his listeners, while adding that the election would be held at the end of the legislature.

He said the sum total of the meetings was that particular attention needed to continue to be given to jobs, education and health. The creation of 20,000 new jobs was the government's biggest achievement, he said.

Another was how 20,000 had graduated from the University and Mcast. Indeed, the jobs situation in Malta was the fourth best in the EU, thanks to sacrifices and tough decisions taken in the past years and which the Labour Party had objected to.

Education, he said, was a government priority, and something of which it was proud, in the same way as it was also proud to be spending €1 million a day on health services. Such funds were being found because wealth was being created, despite the difficult global economic situation. This government had struck a balance between austerity and growth and maintained a stable financial position.

Concluding, Dr Gonzi said he wanted to renew the party's confidence in the people, which always made the right choices. He felt indebted to the people for making those choices and the party should prepare itself for the next choice which the people had to make, even though it was some time away. The party needed to work hard, speak to the people and listen to the people. The people needed to be respected and their ideas should be adopted, as far as possible.

Then when election time came the people would be able to see that the country was being handed back in a better state than it had been at the last elections.