A Labour government would begin the process of drafting three separate pieces of anti-corruption legislation by the end of next week, Labour leader Joseph Muscat said yesterday.
The expedited process would ensure that a Whistleblower Act, party financing law and removal of time-barring in cases of political corruption would be enacted in time for Parliament’s summer recess, he told a Birżebbuġa crowd.
“Everyone’s fed up of the lack of responsibility,” he said.
“This isn’t the sort of politics I want to be a part of.
“My aspiration – and inspiration – has always been for me and my colleagues to do something genuinely new for this country.”
The PL leader said a PL government would encourage small businesses to apply for government tenders rather than set inordinately high entrance criteria, as currently happened.
“How can a small start-up ever apply for a tender that requires applicants to have sold €1 million worth of products to the Government?” he asked.
The PL leader made his pitch to small business owners with a football metaphor.
“I cannot guarantee that you will score a goal. But instead of a spectator, you’ll get the chance to take to the field and kick the ball, without the goalposts moving.”
Entrepreneurs caught in the “institutionalised usury” that was the existing VAT arrears payment system would also be given breathing room, with Dr Muscat telling the crowd “prison is no place for the self-employed”.
Dr Muscat contrasted the PN’s energy proposals with those of the PL, saying the government’s ideas “lacked depth”.
“The Prime Minister first said a gas pipeline would take eight years to build, now it’s become four. They wanted €770 million in EU funding for it and ended up with €63 million... it’s just too vague,” he said.
He said the PL’s energy proposals had “withstood the acid test” of weeks of queries.
But for change to happen, people had to vote for it, he said.
Dr Muscat called on reluctant voters to collect their voting documents and vote early on Saturday for “each and every Labour candidate”.