A law introducing full marriage equality for gay people would be presented to Parliament before the summer recess if the Labour Party were re-elected, Joseph Muscat said.

Reiterating that a new legislature would bring about a major liberal leap forward, the Labour leader said that by the end of the year a new government would also launch a public consultation process on legalising recreational marijuana.

Dr Muscat said he personally agreed with legalising recreational marijuana, when asked this morning at a press conference in which the party unveiled its proposals for disabled people.

He said the Nationalist Party's stand in favour of gay marriage was only taken out of convenience after having abstained on then the civil unions law in 2014 because it did not agree with gay adoptions.

On the main topic of the press conference, he said that in the past four years, over 1,000 persons with disability started working for the first time.

“This was a silent revolution for people with disability, as it affects not only their own dignity but also that of their families,” he told a news conference in Mtarfa.

The Prime Minister admitted there had been some controversy over the government's push to get employers to respect their legal obligations but there was now an agreement in place with both the employers’ associations and the Curia.

The government is also pushing ahead with its plans to build smaller residential homes, to avoid as far as possible having to put people into institutions

“It is good to note that there are now as many companies employing people with disability as there are who opt to pay a fine to be exempted,” he added.

The government is also pushing ahead with its plans to build smaller residential homes for people with disability, to avoid as far as possible having to put people into institutions, especially when their parents or carers died. Dr Muscat said that this was more complex and more expensive as there were fewer economies of scale.

Dr Muscat also announced that the government would also be making it easier for people with a disability to buy their own home by giving them the same stamp duty incentives as first-time buyers.

Answering questions following the press conference, Dr Muscat poured scorn on the Opposition Leader’s claim that a Nationalist government would create 30,000 jobs, saying that his government had exceeded that in just four years.