The Infrastructure Ministry yesterday urged the Malta Resources Authority to verify the figures used in the calculation of the new water and electricity bills.

The consultants engaged by the MRA to verify the workings of the bills found that the methodology used by the ministry was correct but "data accuracy was not verified".

Reacting to the MRA consultants' report, the ministry welcomed the conclusions about the methodology and pointed out that the regulator did not engage its consultants to verify the figures that were inputted into the system.

"Since this part of the assignment was left out of the MRA's consultants' brief, the latter recommended that this is done to complete verification of this process. Of course, MRA has every right and every power to order such a review if it wishes to do so," the ministry said in a statement. .

Verifying the figures, the ministry said, would show that the revision of the bills was carried out in the most transparent manner and that the bills were justifiable.