(Adds MLP statement)

Alternattiva Demokratika today criticised comments by the chairman of the Malta Tourism Authority that the authority believed that the north side of the island needed an area of entertainment to boost tourism, and that the authority's policy was to spread places of entertainment to the north and to develop the coast.

Party leader Arnold Cassola said that in such a congested and overbuilt country as was Malta, the policy of developing the little coastline that was still left free was absolutely preposterous.

Carmel Cacopardo AD Spokesman on Sustainable Development and Local Government, added that the MTA's attitude to the proposal to develop Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando's site at Mistra showed that the MTA did not care about environmental policies.

"Had it cared, it would have noted immediately that the site forms part of a proposal for a Natura 2000 site and hence is protected in terms of the Habitats Directive as transposed into Maltese law."

Mr Cacopardo added that if the MTA intended moving along the path of sustainable tourism in this manner, Malta would be better off without MTA and its leadership.

In his comments, made in court during a hearing on the Mistra case, Mr Mifsaud said the MTA made its recommendations purely from a tourism point of view without considering the environment, which fell within the remit of another organisation.

The Labour Party in a statement this afternoon said that the comments by MTA chairman Sam Mifsud went against any policies of sustainable development.

Marie-Louise Coleiro Preca, Labour spokesman on tourism, and Leo Brincat, spokesman on the environment, said public authorities needed to work together, more so as the environment formed an important component of tourism.