The government is entering an important phase of this legislature, which Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi this morning described as “a challenging one”.

This, however, “does not mean I will call an election next week,” he said when addressing Nationalist Party candidates at Azad.

Dr Gonzi told the candidates that they could visit homes and explain to the people the results achieved by this administration in a very difficult economic climate.

He lauded his government’s achievements to preserve jobs and noted that even taxes had been lowered.

Hard decisions had had to be taken during this legislature to guarantee sustainability.

Dr Gonzi noted that other countries had postponed taking these decisions and the result was the problems being witnessed in Europe.

“We still have a lot of work to do and what we achieved is not guaranteed. Other countries that in the past we used to call tigers have turned into cats as a result of the crisis. We arrived so far in these circumstances, just imagine what we can do when the situation improves,” he said adding that this was the message candidates had to take to the electorate.