The Labour Party has called for a downward revision of museum entrance fees, saying they were the main reason for a sharp decline in the number of visitors.

In a statement over the signature of spokesman Evarist Bartolo, the PL said it had warned when the tariffs were hiked that visitor numbers would go down.

At a time when Malta was preparing to host the European Cultural Capital, the national heritage should be given more importance, and museums and other cultural sites should be more accessible to Maltese and tourists alike.

Visits to museums and historical sites went down by 12 per cent last year, to 1.9 million, when compared to the previous year, according to official statistics.