A document on the reform of the planning authority would be discussed at the next Cabinet meeting, Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi said yesterday.
Outlining his office's achievements over the past year, Dr Gonzi said the document would be discussed at this level so that decisions would start to be taken.
One of the reform's proposals is for decisions on national planning policies to be taken by the government rather than the Malta Environment and Planning Authority.
Taking Mepa under his wing was one of his electoral promises, and Dr Gonzi said that during the first year of the new legislature, the government had carried out 25 per cent of its promises.
Work had started on another 54 per cent. In terms of numbers, 89 promises from 353 were implemented and 191 were in the process of being executed.
He described the past year as one of great challenges, only some of which were actually predicted. A lot of work had been carried out on reform including rent laws, local councils, public transport, Mepa, education, water and electricity tariffs and waste management.
Dr Gonzi said his government had focused on retaining employment levels despite the global recession that was affecting several industries.
He said 1,000 former shipyard employees of the 1,400 who took the early retirement schemes had already found alternative employment. Social services had increased by €52 million to €624 million.
Asked about the country's deficit, the third highest in the eurozone, Dr Gonzi said the reason why this had spiralled in 2008 was the extra expense incurred to subsidise the cost of oil, €51 million, and the €50 million spent on the early retirement schemes to make Malta Shipyards attractive to investors. Moreover, employers were given more time to make payments to the government, so these did not feature in the accounts.
With regard to the government's debt as a ratio of the Gross Domestic Product, Dr Gonzi said this had been cut from nearly 75 per cent in 2007 to 64 per cent, just two per cent more than what was targeted.
Tourism Parliamentary Secretary Mario de Marco said arrivals between November and January were down 13 per cent compared to last year. Guest nights dropped by two per cent. He said measures were being taken to limit the damage as much as possible.
Dr de Marco said the Malta Tourism Authority's marketing team was meeting on a fortnightly basis to prepare a clear way forward for this year.
The biggest problem faced by the industry over the past year was one of accessibility because seat capacity had dropped drastically, mainly due to problems airlines faced.
In the face of such issues, the MTA and the government worked to increase the number of air seats and managed to marginally step these up for the upcoming summer period.
Dr de Marco said talks were under way with local councils to organise several activities, mainly of a cultural nature. He admitted there was a lack of tourist information offices around the islands and said the government was in talks with Maltapost on how its 68 branches could be used as information outlets.
The government was planning a pilot project where a tourism zone manager would be appointed to coordinate work that had to be done in the area of his remit.
The Parliamentary Secretary for Public Dialogue, Chris Said outlined the 20 consultation processes that took place over the past year.
He spoke about the re-establishment of the Malta-EU Steering Action Committee, which had been widened and had nine sub-committees dealing with various subjects, including the environment, competitiveness and agriculture and fisheries, among others.
A funding unit within Meusac, which assisted NGOs with their applications for EU funding, had completed 40 applications totalling €6.7 million. Another 70 applications were to be submitted next month.