The Family Park in Marsascala was developed on a landfill that had been created by the Labour government and it was being visited by 30,000 people every Sunday, the Nationalist Party said.

In a statement replying to claims made by Environment Minister Leo Brincat during a visit to the park yesterday, the PN said the minister did not visit the Visitors Centre, an educational centre that had already facilitated children’s environmental education.

He also failed to visit other zones in the park where he could see and understand better the previous government’s vision for the south when it invested around €6 million on the site.

Before setting up any committees, the PN said, the minister should speak to the mayor who had already been invited to take part in an independent committee set up to analyse air quality, environmental health and other baseline studies besides the park itself.

The minister also tried to fool people when it said that the previous government had not given Inspire any reaction to their business plan to operate the park.

The plan, the ministry said, was only received 15 days before the election and had the government accepted and signed a €3.5 million a year agreement so late in the day without any analyses and verification it would have been irresponsible.

Moreover, the previous government had prepared a due diligence report on Inspire to see what its competence and resources were to operate the facility. It would be wise for the minister to be given a good presentation of this report before he decided what Inspire’s role should be.

The ministry said that the Government’s Parks Section would have always been involved in the management of the park even if the responsibility was passed on to Inspire.

It was clear that the minister was in a state of panic because while the section was previously assisted by the Works Division, the two units were now under separate ministries and Mr Brincat lacked workers and security officers. For this, he was trying to blame the previous administration.