Labour’s electoral proposals cost €732 million, significantly lower and “more realistic” than the PN’s €1.1 billion, according to Labour leader Joseph Muscat.
Addressing a press conference, he said the Nationalist Party assumed unrealistic economic growth calculated on unpublished internal workings. On the other hand, Labour used the more “prudent” projections of the European Commission and the International Monetary Fund.
According to Labour’s plans, Malta could come within half a percentage point of reaching a balanced budget by 2017 while reducing the debt to 65.1 per cent. It would then move towards a surplus.
Claiming at least four “major factual errors” in the PN’s costings, MEP Edward Scicluna said Nationalist plans would realistically translate into a deficit of 1.3 per cent by 2017 and a debt of 65.9 per cent, when calculated on the EU and IMF projections of economic growth. This was a far cry from PN’s claims that it would reach a balanced budget and a surplus by 2017.
A PN government would either break Malta’s treasury, introduce new taxes or fail to implement its promises, said Dr Muscat, insisting that his proposals were realistic rather than lacking in ambition.
The electorate’s choice was between a party that consistently missed its own targets and suffered two downgrades and a “competent” party which was being more realistic and based itself on “facts, not assumptions or opinions”.
Dr Muscat said economic growth under Labour’s plans would come from reducing energy production costs, boosting employment through projects like free childcare, introducing active labour market policies and reducing bureaucracy.
He said the PN’s proposals were based on reducing the country’s recurrent expenditure by more than two per cent. But this was impossible unless there were cuts in social benefits, education or health, which the PN was denying,
Dr Muscat said Labour was not playing “auction politics” and was actually projecting to spend less than the PN, rather than raising the stakes. This was because the competition should not be between who spent more, but who spent better.
Warning that PN’s proposals would lead to “big financial problems” for the country, he said Labour’s were prudent and left more leeway for capital expenditure since it was only projecting €416 million in capital expenditure over four years, whereas the country usually spent €450 million each year. This meant that Labour was allocating 25 per cent of the budget to capital expenses, giving it 75 per cent leeway. PN only gave itself 30 per cent leeway.
Dr Muscat said Labour’s proposals were in line with the Maastricht criteria and would not result in excessive deficit procedures.
Responding to questions, Dr Muscat said Labour’s electoral manifesto was printed on Sunday but the last amendments were made just after the Budget. He denied that changes were made during the electoral campaign or that ideas were copied from the PN but said no one had a monopoly on good ideas.
Asked about the case of Tony Zarb, Dr Muscat urged the Nationalist Party’s media to publish the full audio recording so the public could decide who was telling the truth about whether Mr Zarb was proposing to help a company with tenders or speaking about precarious employment conditions.
Asked whether the General Workers’ Union general secretary should resign, Dr Muscat said he would not tell Mr Zarb what to do but reiterated that no one could speak on behalf of the Labour Party except its officials.
Meanwhile, deputy leader Louis Grech and Dr Muscat both denied categorically that Labour’s manifesto or policies were in any way dictated or influenced by contractors as had been implied by former deputy leader Anġlu Farrugia.