Labour spokesman Anton Refalo has charged that Gozo Minister Giovanna Debono had lost credibility and accused the government of adopting a policy of clientelism and individualism in Gozo.
Opening the debate on the financial estimates of the Gozo Ministry, Dr Refalo the government had failed in its eco project and employment and gave a long list of promises which had not been kept by successive PN governments since 1987. He said the government’s policy for Gozo was confusing.
Dr Refalo said that no care orders were handed down in Gozo because the government had still not reached an agreement with Church to provide a home for abused children. The government had also failed to build a home for the elderly in Gozo where the number of OAPs would increase to 1,500 by 2013.
He said that unkept promises made by nationalist governments for Gozo included an electrical generation plant, the sea passenger terminal, a yacht marina, conference facilities, development in the agro tourist sector, the golf course and Żewwieqa projects. The construction of an industrial park in Xewkija which had been promised in 1999 was not implemented with the tender process still not concluded 12 years later. The waste transfer station which had been promised since 2000 had not materialised.
For eco Gozo the government had promised an investment of €25 million over three years, but only €7.5 million would have been spent during this period. Projects included in the Eco Gozo programme included renting an electric car the ministry and medical records at the Gozo hospital.
Dr Refalo said that the number of unemployed youths in Gozo increased by 652 this year. Out of 4,020 people under 20 years old, only 1,617 had a job. Only two out of 286 university graduates from Gozo in 2008 had found work there.
The government, said Dr Refalo, did not have a strategy for transferring government departments’ work in Gozo. He was sure that a group of Gozitan government employees would be transferred to work in Gozo before the election.
The employment aid programme in Gozo fell victim to the Minister client list policy with no person engaged in the scheme proposed by the ETC. Only 55 of these employees remained in the scheme after the one-year period where the wages were subsidised through EU funds by 50 per cent. The government had not allocated extra funds in its estimates to extend the additional allowance to all Gozitan students studying in Malta.
Dr Refalo also criticised Malta Enterprise for failing to come up with an investment plan for jobs.
Home loans had increased by €256 million in the last 10 years while deposits increased only by €225 million during the same period.
Justyne Caruana (PL) said there were 1,988 Gozitan cancer sufferers who have travel to Malta frequently for treatment at Boffa hospital. She said treatment should also be offered in Gozo.