Opposition leader Alfred Sant said yesterday that the budget presented last week was one of political convenience.

Speaking in Parliament, Dr Sant said the popular reaction to the budget speech was "too little, too late" and the Labour Party shared that view.

The budget featured no measures to curb inflation, which was the most serious problem the people had to grapple with, and was lacking also in measures to create jobs, raise education standards, fight corruption and rein in the squandering of taxpayers' money. As for social measures, the government was only giving back a little of the plenty it had taken over the past few years. But this was too late, a reaction to the panic gripping the government as the elections approached.

For years, Malta had had a government bent only on pleasing the bankers, but it had now realised that ordinary people also voted at elections. Yet the budget revealed once more how disconnected the government was from society.

Ever since becoming Prime Minister, Dr Gonzi had adopted the slogan "biex int tghix ahjar". Yet most people were not better off and the chorus for a change of administration was growing.

Dr Gonzi had claimed in his budget speech that the economy had recovered, with GDP growing by 3.6 per cent. The same claims were made last year. But was economic growth benefitting the big bankers or the common man?

Two recent surveys published in The Sunday Times had shown that 71 per cent of the people felt that the economic situation was either stagnant or getting worse.

Clearly, Dr Sant said, the people were not feeling the economic upswing which Dr Gonzi was boasting about.

And with good reason.

The government was boasting about an upturn in tourist arrivals, yet Malta had only returned to the performance of four years ago. This was obviously better than last year's but nothing to shout about.

Most of the economic growth was coming from sectors which did not have a significant trickle down effect on the population, such as gaming and financial services. The MLP wanted these sectors to continue to grow, but it would also give importance to other sectors which the government had sidelined, such as manufacturing industry and tourism, which were the major employers.

The government knew that current economic growth was not as sustainable as it claimed it to be. Indeed, IMF projections for next year showed that the growth rate would slow by 13 per cent under current conditions and slow again in 2009.

The MLP could not accept such projections and would launch a strategic plan to ensure there was sustainable growth of 4 to 6 per cent of GDP in real terms which would translate into productive, full-time jobs. Indeed, the absence of measures for job creation were a major shortcoming of this budget.

Dr Gonzi was boasting that the gainfully occupied population was at a record level since Independence. How could it be otherwise, when the population was much smaller 40 years ago!

But a careful reading of the figures showed that job creation was actually slowest in the three years of Dr Gonzi's premiership. In the three years between 1964 and 1966, 6,780 jobs were created. Between 1974 and 1977 there were 12,105 new full-time jobs; between 1984 and 1987, 12,700 new jobs and between 1994 and 1997, 6,457. Yet under Dr Gonzi the gainfully occupied had only increased by 2,453, the smallest gain ever! Job creation was indeed one of the biggest failures of his stewardship.

What Malta was currently seeing was growth in part-time jobs as the principal occupation, with many of these workers forced to work under poor conditions and no job security. At the same time real incomes were decreasing and, when compared to other EU countries, Malta had the lowest percentage of the population in gainful employment and the lowest participation rate by women.

Dr Sant said the government seemed to have given up on manufacturing industry, with 1,496 jobs shed by this sector in the past three years. Labour did not share the government's pessimism on this sector. Rather it saw a future for it and, once in government, it would form a task force with industry leaders to introduce measures so that in three to four years' time 2,000 new jobs would be created in this sector. A Labour government would also promote new investment in manufacturing, technology and related service industry so as to create 4,000 new jobs in four years.

It would also act to safeguard the interests of firms such as ST Microelectronics after euro adoption. It would evaluate the state of the shipyards and bring in a strategy aimed at giving them a future.

Enemalta, too, would be given its due importance, with modernisation of electricity generation and use of alternative sources of energy.

Turning to SmartCity, Dr Sant said a Labour government would act to ensure that the thousands of jobs promised in eight years' time would come about, and that Maltese young people were sufficiently trained to take them. Labour wanted genuine aims for this project and not a screen for the building of luxury apartments.

It was also promising support for investors in IT, without discrimination.

Coming back to tourism, Dr Sant said this was an example of manifest government incompetence. Thankfully, the number of arrivals had started to go up again but the government's own targets had still not been reached. The Tourism Authority was still without a CEO, it lacked a long-term policy on low-cost airlines and there was no plan for Air Malta. Under Dr Gonzi, hotels had shed 600 jobs and by the end of this year another three hotels would close, with a total of 3,000 beds.

Earnings from tourism were also back to 2004 levels. How could the country be satisfied with this when competing destinations were seeing growth of three to five times.

Labour would work with the private sector and aim to attract 1.6 million tourists per year in three to four years' time under the slogan "Who dares wins." There would be assistance to hotels, including those in the three-star category, promotion of the south of Malta, cutbacks in taxation, more arrivals on low-cost airlines, a strengthening of Air Malta. Labour would build two golf courses in Malta and one in Gozo as public-private partnerships which would not be accompanied by the building of apartments. There would also be new yacht marinas.

Turning to agriculture and fisheries, Dr Sant said the government had abandoned this sector and promises had not been kept. The sector's contribution to GDP had shrunk to 2.2 per cent from over 3 per cent.

A lack of interest was also being demonstrated by the government in the self-employed. Under Labour this sector too would benefit from reduced bureaucracy and a reduction of the burden of taxation.

Dr Sant said that the government was taking the Gozitans for granted. Yet Gozo was an example of carelessness, to the extent that out of a financial allocation of Lm20.5 million over the past few years only 12.3 million were used. For next year the capital allocation would decrease.

Dr Gonzi had produced a list of projects which included many items which had been promised for years but never materialised.

Labour, he said, was promising assistance to farmers and fishermen, a boost for tourism in Gozo, direct assistance to the handicrafts sector, a subsidy for a helicopter service and the creation of a regional council for Gozo.

Dr Sant said the government had forgotten local councils in the Budget speech, despite their good work with falling budgets. Labour was promising to join each council on two projects which the council could not carry out on its own.

Touching on government finance, Dr Sant said Labour considered the issue of Malta adopting the euro on January 1 as closed. Up to the last election the PN had boasted that government finances were on a sound footing. Then in 2003 it looked for measures to fill the financial hole and, with the economy stagnant, opted to raise tax revenue. VAT went up to 18 per cent and all fees and tariffs increased, so that Eurostat figures showed Malta having one of the heaviest rates of tax revenue growth.

The government had acted to satisfy the bankers. Now, at last, it was trying to satisfy the people. But here too, it listed many projects which were also promised before, such as the rebuilding of the Ta' Qali crafts village, the rehabilitation of the Marsaxlokk promenade and the bastions, the building of an animal welfare centre, an oncology centre at Zammit Clapp Hospital, a reduction of hospital waiting lists, and rehabilitation of Ggantija and the Zewwieqa promenade.

And then there were several proposals which had been copied, practically word for word, from Labour's oft criticised plans, like the extension of maternity leave, the refund or reduction of VAT for clubs and sport and cultural activities, benefits for companies which supported culture, a fund for scholarships, tax rebates for those in private old peoples' homes, the breast screening programme and the interest subsidy for first time house buyers.

It was an absolute shame, Dr Sant said, that even as he announced the breast screening programme, Dr Gonzi must have known that Malta had neither a plan nor the resources to implement it. This had been confirmed by doctors who had written in the press. This announcement showed a lack of moral rectitude.

The government had long promised a lot but failed to deliver. Thankfully, because of the election, it had taken an eleventh hour decision to reduce income tax, a measure which even many ministers had not been aware of. But there was something wrong in the figures. How would economic growth translate into VAT revenue climbing by five per cent and income tax revenue by 12 per cent?

These tax cuts would not benefit those who had a part-time job as their principal occupation. Nor would it serve to boost competitiveness and job creation.

A future Labour government would introduce measures which, while safeguarding jobs, would not tax overtime.

Dr Sant underlined the importance which he said his party gives to families and observed that despite comments on shortcomings in legislation by former Children's Commissioner, Sonia Camilleri, the government had not moved amendments.

A report by the Institute for Family Policy showed that spending on family policies in Malta was among the lowest in the EU.

It was good that the government was raising children's allowance at last. But it was worth pointing out that whereas in 1997 there were 49,000 families who received children's allowance, last year there were only 33,636. Government spending on the allowances had shrunk from Lm20.4 million in 1997 to Lm13.3 million last year. Next year the government would spend Lm17.9 million, which was Lm2.5 million less than in 1997.

Labour was promising to give children's allowance to all families having children while restoring it to what it was in the past.

Labour was also promising that workers would not continue to lose public holidays which fell on weekends.

On the elderly, Dr Sant said more medicines would be made available on the National Health Service. The cost of living increase would be given in full in pensions, and not partly as a bonus as this government was doing. And the reduction in the pension of those living in government old people's homes would be 65 per cent and not 80 per cent as at present.

The process launched in 1996 would be continued so that all former services personnel would not have deductions in their two-thirds pension.

Dr Sant stressed that inflation was the biggest problem facing society. It was true that cereal prices had gone up abroad, but that only accounted for part of the price hikes in Malta. The government was doing too little, too late to control the price of medicines.

It had also announced price freeze agreements with major importers, after having allowed prices to rise. Those agreements had not been published, and the people rightly feared a price explosion after March. One could see how in Slovenia, which adopted the euro last January, prices went up in March. That the government had brought forward Lm1 from the cost of living adjustment expected next year was another example of its electoral panic, but it had not taken measures to actually control prices.

The most effective measure would have involved the power surcharge, which had caused social and economic mayhem and which Labour was promising to reduce by half.

Labour also expected that as a good will gesture, the importers who had signed the prize freeze agreements to March would retain them for a further two months to give time for the regulatory mechanism to function well within the norms of a free market. The time for price controls was past, but the market had to be truly free and competition had to be real.

Dr Sant hit out at the government over education, pointing out that Malta had remained near the bottom of the Lisbon agenda scoreboard with regard to graduates in IT and technology and people in tertiary education.

The change this government had brought about was in re-naming structures. And the Prime Minister was insisting there was no VAT on education when the Education Division itself had issued a circular to heads of schools, telling them to ensure that VAT was collected when uniforms and books were sold by their schools.

The MLP would act to remove VAT from education in conformity with EU rules.

It would also give real priority to schooling and resources including the introduction of a new reception class in primary schools and an increase in per capita spending on students. There would be a stronger accent on IT and science and a new regional sixth form.

Near the end of his speech, Dr Sant said this was a government which did not deliver on its promises such as the flood relief project for Birkirkara, the White Rocks project, City Gate, the Opera House, the redevelopment of Dock 1, the rehabilitation of Fort St Elmo, the bus terminus, the hotel at Vittoriosa, the Hagar Qim cover project, the restoration of the Macina, the communal centre in Gozo, the sewage treatment plants and the Xemxija yacht marina, all of which had not materialised yet.

Other projects took ages to complete and had gone Lm191 million over budget. This repeated incompetence was not coincidental.

Transparency International had reported a significant worsening of the level of perceived corruption in Malta in 2007, placing the country on the same plane as Laos, Butan, Nepal, Papua New Guinea and Thailand.

Several cases had been raised, including Dr Frank Portelli's claims on commissions given for the building of Mater Dei Hospital, the web of abuses in the Transport Authority which minister Censu Galea had spoken about but not acted upon, the conviction of two Transport Authority officials for bribery, the racket in the granting of licences by the Malta Maritime Authority, the way the cleaning contract was awarded at the law courts, the manner how Minister Ninu Zammit was compensated for expropriated land before other people, bribery in the granting of invalidity pensions, and the way how road contracts in Gozo went through the same persons. There was also the case how a company in which the roads minister had an interest had changed its name and been awarded major contracts. At the same time, an inquiry report into the purchase of air tickets by the government, requested by John Dalli, had not been published.

Yet these were just the tip of the iceberg. Dr Gonzi was trying to defend his ministers because he had no choice, since he had been the one to retain a Cabinet which was tired and lacked ideas.

It was no wonder that the people wanted a change of government. They wanted an administration that did not tolerate corruption, that was accountable and efficient and which would boost industry and trade and achieve the best from EU membership rather than lose millions in funds allocated for Malta. They wanted a government whose policies would not be dictated by political expediency but by a commitment to improve the people's living standards, Dr Sant concluded.