The Prime Minister should immediately reconvene Parliament and seek a vote of confidence in his government, Labour leader Joseph Muscat said this afternoon, saying the vote was needed to stop uncertainty and speculation.

Dr Muscat was addressing a news conference following the appointment of three new ministers and the announcement that the government will be giving up the ministerial pay rise given at the beginning of this legislature.

He said that the 'new' cabinet did not offer anything new for the needs of the country.

The Prime Minister was three years late in appointing a justice minister who was separate from the home minister, and in dividing justice and home affairs - both proposals originally made by the PL. It was also three years late in refusing the €500 raise that had been given to ministers.

The Labour leader said that Maltese families had not started to feel the economic problems now, but they had been feeling them for the past years and the Prime Minister only said ministers would be giving up their raise after Labour declared it would rescind the raise once it was in government.

In the past three and a half years, he said, the Prime Minister, ministers and parliamentary secretaries had taken between them a total of €1 million in increases.

"Give them back," Dr Muscat said.

He noted that the government was giving up these increases now because it felt it had no other way.

The country needed change and the pantomimes which had taken place in recent days were not at all helpful.

Instability was hindering the country's economy and the country needed a

Stable government which took decisions that would have been planned well.