Mario Galea, Parliamentary Secretary for the Elderly and Community Care, should be more careful in speaking out loud about Maltese families. I hope he considered deeply before calling families irresponsible, and accusing them of committing criminal acts.

Mr Galea was referring to people who leave elderly relatives in hospital, instead of going to pick them up. Some 1,000 patients had to be transferred to government homes last year after treatment at hospital, he said. The previous year the figure was 1,083 and last month over 100 had overstayed at the hospital, he added.

I can understand his concern. Such a situation is bound to affect the situation at the hospital, dubbed state, of-the-art, but which is so deficient to Malta's needs, in spite of its huge cost, as it turns out.

But did Mr Galea ever wonder why people leave their relatives with the government, instead of caring for them? Has the government conducted any research into the problem?

Could it be, perhaps, that families are finding they cannot make ends meet? Perhaps Joseph Muscat is right, after all, when he says that families are being overburdened.

And they are. A single man I know is out of the house most of the day, does not have a washing machine so does his clothes washing manually, and hardly watches television except for the news. He still got an electricity bill for over €150.

In a way, I guess, these families Mr Galea referred to found themselves in a parlous situation money-wise and are imitating the government. How is the government dealing with the situation of its weak finances? Why, it is raising taxes, lumping us with exorbitant energy and water bills, and showing no concern whatsoever for the hardships it is inflicting. Those families which cannot cope and have an elderly relative to care for are putting the ball back in the government's court. Here, they say, you care for our relative, we just do not have the means to do it ourselves.

I wonder, has Mr Galea considered that?