The Finance Ministry said this afternoon that claims by Labour spokesmen that the government was giving a wrong picture of the state of the economy only served to show their impressive detachment from reality and a poor grasp of how the world economy works.
The ministry was reacting to a press conference given this morning by the PL spokesman on the economy and on finance - Karmenu Vella and Charles Mangion.
The ministry noted that the PL spokesmen had compared the growth forecast issued this week by the International Monetary Fund with the government's own growth forecast for 2012, made in November 2011.
"The IMF has come up with lower forecasts on the basis of developments which have taken place over the past weeks which have unfortunately seen a rapid deterioration of the European economy as highlighted in reports presented by the IMF and Standard and Poor's. This is precisely what Government has been warning about – a fact which Labour deems convenient to ignore," the ministry said.
Moreover, the ministry said, in comparing end-of-year projections for financial results with figures for the first nine months, the Opposition should know that significant revenue streams, particularly Government's tax revenue, take place towards the end of the year.
"Hence, the economic and financial arguments brought about by the Opposition can only be explained either as an effort to confuse people or else a very worrying exercise."
Conveniently, the ministry said, Labour was hiding Malta's real results in terms of job creation, including a recently published European Commission report which stated that Malta was amongst a limited pool of countries to experience job increases in the crisis period. Malta currently has the fifth lowest unemployment rate in the European Union, the ministry said.
"Lastly, the Opposition is also incorrect in its comments on Air Malta. Government has been consistent in its position that a recapitalisation plan is now allowed unless a restructuring plan is approved by the Commission. Government's decision to inject close to €200 million through equity and property purchase in our national airline is the confirmation of Government's commitment towards giving a future to Air Malta."
See PL press conference at
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20120125/local/government-giving-misleading-view-of-the-economy-pl.403826