Parliament is this evening debating a confidence motion in the government, proposed by the Prime Minister last Friday after a no-confidence motion in Transport Minister Austin Gatt was only defeated with the Speaker's casting vote. The debate started at 6 p.m.
9.35 p.m. - Government wins confidence vote 35 in favour, 34 against.
9.34 p.m. - Voting underway. Roll call of MPs.
9.30 p.m. - Explaining his vote, Nationalist MP Franco Debono says he had proposed to the PN Parliamentary Group that a motion of confidence in the government should be presented, and he would back it. Referring to the setting of the public transport task force he says the reform had embarrassed the government and led to complaints and the prime minister was now shouldering the burden. It was important that such reforms were handled more diligently.
9.30 p.m. - Prime Minister concludes his speech amid applause.
9.27 p.m. - Dr Gonzi says this debate conveys a message of stability in the interests of Malta's workers. It shows that the government can live with internal criticism and one learns from what takes place. The government's majority is stable and will continue to push the government forward in the national interest.
9.22 pm - Dr Gonzi says the government's investment in education is meant to ensure that investment continues, with foreign investors finding the skills they need. This is the government's opposition. What is that of the Labour Party? For the PL, it seemed that Malta should have kept the dockyard, despite its losses. The government had tried to save the dockyard, but in the end it was clear that it was irresponsible to retain it once financial viability could not be achieved in terms of EU regulations. That was independent of the Fairmount contracts.
9.15 pm. PM underlines incentives given to SMEs, including tax cuts on investment and micro-credit. Insists government policies go beyond the next election (interruptions). The PN is continuing the transformation of the economy from one which was based on manufacturing into one that was more mixed and vibrant and included new areas such as IT, financial services and aircraft maintenance. But wise investment in areas such as the power station went hand in hand. What would happen to industry if there was no power of if power? Thanks to this government, for the first time ever, Malta would have multiple sources of energy - including the power station, the interconnector, and possibly further in the future, a gas pipeline to Europe which could possibly also be used for the power station.
9.10 pm - Prime Minister defends building of new Parliament. Says this is providing work for Maltese workers. One way how countries stimulated the economy was through infrastructural projects. And the ultimate aim is that once parliament moves out of the Palace, that beautiful building can be restored to its former grandeur to become a hub of the Maltese identity, attracting the Maltese and foreigners alike.
9.02 pm - Prime Minister highlights the fact that Malta has maintained high credit ratings. He quotes Standard & Poors which in the latest report said that Malta has 'effective policy making that delivers relatively stable economic growth'. This is a government of all the Maltese (boos) which has safeguarded jobs, expanded the University and Mcast and is building a new school every year. And then Dr Muscat said the governemnt lacked vision.
9 pm - PM reacts to claims that the government has a defective majority. Today's debate was proof of the contrary. Franco Debono had himself in the PN executive proposed this evening's debate and would back the government, like all the other MPs.
8.58 pm - Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi starts his winding up. Says that while Dr Muscat criticised the government for harking to the past, he had done so himself. But he did not refer to his own past, including his opposition to EU membership, a historic mistake which, had it come to pass, would have affected all members of society.
8.54 pm - Labour compares itself with those who are better off. It wants real economic growth for sustainable deficit reduction. It will thus assist businesses. The Prime Minister's duty is to restore stability. Problems will not go away with tonight's vote. The vote will pass, the problems will remain.
8.46 pm - Muscat: Government resorting to the policies of fear, but this was seen in the past when Labour carried out major reforms including the health service, maternity leave and civil marriage.
8.45 pm - Muscat: Malta is in the state it is, not because of the government, but despite the government and thanks to the people
8.38 pm - Muscat says the Prime Minister has taken a series of bad decisions and the people are feeling their standard of living deteriorating. The government is cut off from the reality Maltese and Gozitans are facing. It used to have a vision but this has now disappeared and there is no hope for the future.
8.34 pm - Dr Muscat said that more than a year has passed since both sides agreed on IVF legislation but no Bill has yet been moved. He says the prime minister voted in favour of an EU recommendation for a raising of the retirement age. This could either mean that people who had thought they could retire before they were 65 will not be able to do so or that the retirement age will be over 65. The PL will opt for a different solution - economic growth and encouraging women to return to employment.
8.30 pm - Muscat says that within three months Dr Gonzi will announce a major u-turn - that the power station extension will use diesel instead of heavy fuel oil.
8.24 pm - Dr Muscat accuses the Prime Minister of insensitivity when he said that water and electricity rates had to be raised so that people take up energy saving measures. He says that Labour made several proposals in the past three and a half years - on immigration, the cost of living, maternity leave, Mepa reform. The Prime Minister now wanted to know how Labour will reduce rates. There is more than one way of doing so and Labour is not bound to one solution or another.
8.21 pm - Dr Muscat says Labour and the people are waiting patiently for Monday's budget. He recalls the income tax cuts promises and says they were only an election ploy.
8.18 p.m. - Dr Muscat hits out over the ministerial pay rise and highlights the poor conditions of hospital care workers. He also insists that Labour knows exactly what to do to reduce power tariffs, and it will keep it word, without widening the deficit. Interruptions.
8.16 pm - Dr Muscat highlights areas where government and opposition worked together, including the Ombudsman law, EU treaties and the rent law. But the prime minister showed himself unable to keep a united team. He backed out of the vote on the Co-Cathedral Museum and shelved the primary healthcare reform because he did not have a majority. The prime minister lost out on divorce and his hand was forced in other areas, such as the law on legal assistance to arrested persons. That Dr Gonzi had said that people were not protesting over living conditions but about the buses did not mean, as he seemed to think, that the people did not have huge problems.
8.12 pm - Muscat hits out at the handling of the bus service reform. The prime minister, he says, needs to decide whether he really has confidence in Austin Gatt after defending him on Friday, and then substituting him today. Surely the prime minister should be focused on the economy instead of taking over the bus service from Austin Gatt. But apparently, the prime minister really has a limited talent pool.
8.05 pm - Muscat says Lawrence Gonzi is showing weak leadership, pretending that problems do not exist. His confidence vote was not caused by the international situation or the problems in Air Malta or elsewhere. This vote was called because the government has a defective majority in Parliament.
8.02 p.m. - Joseph Muscat says the confidence vote will pass but the government's problems will remain. The government, as shown in the debate so far, is still in the past, lost in surreal triumphalism showing itself to be cut off from reality. Instead of addressing the root cause of the problem which led to this confidence motion, the government is ignoring the fact that it is being held hostage, as is the country's stability.
8 pm - The government deserves the confidence vote because the will of the majority expressed in the election has to be respected, but also because of the results achieved int he past three years, Borg concludes.
7.48 pm -Tonio Borg recalls rent reforms and the end of requisitions. The former Labour government used to requisition private properties to hand them to the Labour Party itself. (interruptions)
7.53 pm - Tonio Borg recalls Malta's role in the Libyan uprising and its early condemnation of Gaddafi's atrocities. "Without firing a shot or taking part in military action, we drew the admiration of those who wanted change in Libya."
7.51pm – Under this government more elderly people are opting to continue to work because they can still receive their pension. This government set up local councils and has been raising their funding, enabling them, among other things, to build more roads.
7.48 p.m. 4,400 operations were carried out at Mater Dei Hospital in the first six months of the year and the prices of 166 medicines were reduced. No other government spent as much as this one on the environment and this government also revolutionised waste management.
7.39 pm - With the sale of the shipyard by the government is saving some €25m per year which used to be given as subsidies. Such funds and more from other former subsidies, are now being invested in tourism - where Malta is enjoying record numbers. Malta is also investing more in education and more students are now following post secondary courses. The government in a year had also distributed a record €58m on free medicines.
7.34 pm - Borg: The government's over-riding priority has always been protecting and creating jobs and it deserves confidence especially on this score. Economic growth last year, in a difficult scenerio, was among the best in the EU. Unemployment at 6.3% is the fifth lowest in Europe and just ovr half the European average. The average wage was up 4.3% over last year. The gainfully occupied this year is up 3.180. Was this a loss of direction by the government? Hardly.
7.29 pm - Foreign Minister Tonio Borg takes over. Points out that in preaching democracy, Labour speakers forget that their party governed for five years against the will of the people. This confidence motion showed the government's strength since the MP who abstained last week had himself proposed this debate and said he would back the government.
7.24pm - Anglu Farrugia: shameful that 82,000 people are in poverty or at risk of poverty.
7.17pm - Anglu Farrugia says the government has to explain how major contracts were awarded to the same contractor and how corruption was alleged in the yacht repair facility sale. They wanted to know why €270,000 were spent on the Mita building façade and €170,000 in other consultancy, and how €2.5m were spent on the breakwater bridge. Would the government explain why it spent thousands to rent ambulances instead of buying enough for Mater Dei? Why were medicines out of stock in government dispensaries? Was it any wonder that the government's own MPs were complaining that they were not being heard?
Scene – Some three quarters of MPs are in the Chamber. Franco Debono entered the House shortly after the debate started and chatted with Labour MPs Jose’ Herrera and Gino Cauchi, PN MP Edwin Vassallo and Parliamentary Secretary Mario de Marco.
7.12pm - What has become of the promised 5,000 jobs at SmartCity? How will the loss of €70m on the Fairmount contracts at the shipyard be explained? What is to become of Air Malta? Will Austin Gatt continue to enjoy his €500 salary increase despite his failure? What of the Qawra land handed to Go with Maltacom's privatisation? What of the hospital waiting lists?
7.01pm - Dr Farrugia notes that had the Prime Minister been sure his government enjoyed confidence, he would not have moved such a motion. The people wanted answers, not least about the country's €5 billion debt and many unkept promises
6.58 pm - Dr Farrugia says Transport Malta is renting up to 20 coaches per day at €500 each to pick up people from bus stops because of the inefficient bus service. This will cost the country several million euro per year.
6.57 p.m. - Creation of Transport task force by the prime minister is vote of no confidence in Austin Gatt and shows that Franco Debono was right to abstain in Friday's vote.
6.51 p.m. - Dr Farrugia says the government is unstable because one of its MP abstained in the no confidence motion against the Transport Minister last Friday. The government has lost direction, Malta has rule of the few The Prime MInister is weak with his colleagues but tough with the people.
6.48 p.m. - PL deputy leader Anglu Farrugia says the Prime Minister had to go to Parliament tonight because the government was insecure. He is obliging his MPs to vote in favour of his confidence motion.
6.46 p.m. - PM- Courageous decisions to reform, despite sacrifices, have kept Malta going and to remain competitive. PM concludes speech.
6.39 pm - Dr Gonzi: Were it up for the opposition, power tariffs would have been kept low artificially, and then taxes would have had to go up for everyone and Marsa power station would have been kept open. The opposition never offered proposals. It said it has plans to reduce tariffs, without saying how. Will its measures mean higher subsidies and, hence, a wider deficit? And will that take Malta to the same financial problems of the neighbouring countries? Clearly, the Opposition has no real solution for the power tariffs and this is a political game much like how Alfred Sant had wanted to replace VAT with CET.
6.30 - The prime minister highlights the explosion in oil prices after 2008 and says the decision to raise electricity and water tariffs was a responsible one. Had that decision not been taken, the deficit would have gone up sharply and Malta would have undermined its financial structure. The government however regretted the burden on low income people and measures had been taken to ease this burden. Decisions on the power station extension and the interconnector were taken with an eye on keeping tariffs as low as possible. And the polluting Marsa power station will be closed.
6.25 - Prime Minister says the situation in Malta contrasts with other countries. The protest in Valletta last Friday was not about austerity or jobs. It was about the bus service. The government wants to apologise for the inconvenience caused by the bus service and is determined to provide an efficient service. But what a difference from the situation in Greece, Italy, Spain and elsewhere! "The storm hit everyone, but Malta was able to ride the waves because it had direction and a firm hand on the rudder".
6.20 - Prime Minister says people abroad are losing confidence in their governments and the institutions and this can lead to a loss of the legitimacy of government. Whatever the political price, the governemnt in Malta wants to ensure that Malta does not sink into the financial problems of other countries. But this requires sacrifices. The government does not take some sort of masochistic pleasure in demanding sacrifices, but it does what is required for the long-term good of the country and its people.
6.16 pm - Prime Minister speaks on the fallout of the financial and economic crises, notably austerity measures in various countries and widespread unemployment and protests in Greece, Italy, Spain and the UK.
6.11 pm - Dr Gonzi says he had warned during the electoral campaign of troubled waters ahead, but no one could have ever anticipated the worst financial and economic crises in generations.
6.06 pm - The prime minister says the instability north and south of Malta demands a sense of responsibility in Malta as any single wrong decision can unbalance the economy with consequences for workers and their families. It is therefore important for Malta to have serenity as it faces its challenges. The people expect a stable government they can rely on. "I am not prepared to leave the people in any doubt about the stability of the government".
Dr Gonzi says some are trying to ignore what is happening around Malta, lest people compare and contrast, reaching the obvious conclusion that the government is doing well. But, Dr Gonzi said, he was confident truth will prevail.
6.05 pm- Prime Minister formally presents the confidence motion. The debate is to continue till 9.30 p.m.
6 pm - Sitting starts with the tabling of various documents in reply to parliamentary questions.
Today's confidence debate is only the third in Maltese political history. George Borg Olivier sought and was given a confidence vote in his first term in 1950 but his government collapsed soon after - although he was subsequently able to string a coalition government.
Alfred Sant lost a vote on the Cottonera marina project linked to a conference vote in 1998, ending the short life of his government.
Nationalist MP Franco Debono, who abstained in Friday's vote, has said he will back the government this evening, but he has complained to the PN parliamentary group about not being given time to speak tonight - arguing he needs to further explain his position after what happened on Friday. Debono also says he was the one who proposed tonight's debate in the PN executive. The PN parliamentary group yesterday decided that only the prime minister and Foreign Minister Tonio Borg should speak from the government benches this evening.