The government plans to publish the power station contract for public scrutiny and it is currently seeing what commercially sensitive information it may contain, Prime Minister Joseph Muscat said this morning.

The Prime Minister was replying to questions following a visit to AppleCore Foods. The contract was signed behind closed doors on Friday.

During question time in Parliament yesterday, Energy Minister Konrad Mizzi refused a request to publish the contract with Electrogas, saying questions about it should be made in writing.

The Prime Minister was also asked about the publication of the contract with Henley and Partners and said this could not be done because a court case had been filed by the company represented by Nationalist MP Francis Zammit Dimech. In a decree the court had agreed that the contract should not be made public.

On the planned gas storage offshore facility in Marsaxlokk, the Prime Minister said the application referred to in a story by Times of Malta had been submitted by the previous government. This government, he said, had left it active  because studies were underway.

Once these studies were concluded the government would be in a position to make an informed choice about whether to have a gas pipeline or an offshore facility.

Dr Muscat also said that the €11 million top up that had been added to the Jeremie fund for SMEs in September had been completely taken up and discussions were now underway at a European level on other SME initiatives aimed at helping SMEs to invest.