Labour leader Joseph Muscat said today the PN leadership contest had yielded more problems for Lawrence Gonzi.
Speaking in Zurrieq, Dr Muscat said that over and above his problems with Franco Debono, the prime minister was now faced with a situation where two MPs, Jesmond Mugliett and Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando, had not voted for him.
Dr Muscat said that the government needed to immediately start submitted legislation to votes in parliament. No vote had been taken since last month's confidence debate, when the Speaker had to use his casting vote, Dr Muscat said. If the government did not submit itself to votes in parliament, it would be showing that the political crisis was continuing to persist and the problems had become more serious.
Dr Muscat said the government should immediately set a date for debate in parliament on the Opposition motion on the justice sector.
On Air Malta, Dr Muscat said the current situation was the result of the government's mistaken policies and decisions.
He asked who would assume responsibility for misleading the public after a Times report on Air Malta giving up airport slots was denied by the government, only for the same thing to be revealed in an EU report a day later.
The labour leader said he believed in Air Malta's future and the airline would have a good future under Labour.
On the cases of alleged bribery in road works contracts, Dr Muscat said this was a very serious case, involving 20 contracts and €500,000 of taxpayers' money. Had the variations in road contracts been checked, and by whom?
Turning to hospital overcrowding, Dr Muscat said this was a case of management by crisis. The government was proposing small solutions for major problems and was not seeking the problem in the long term, he said. The former Labour government, he said, had started talks on adding a fifth floor to Mater Dei but the PN government stopped these plans and now more storeys could not be added, even if one wanted to.
Dr Muscat also hit out at the government for reducing the budgets of social agencies as part of its spending cuts while squandering money elsewhere, showing it was a government of double standards.