Infrastructure Minister Austin Gatt has laid to rest the myth about people living in new streets paying their "road contributions", saying they were harbouring an illusion.

Answering a number of opposition supplementary questions on road building, Dr Gatt said that the road contributions people were asked to pay went into Mepa's coffers. The total amount collected represented some 14 per cent of the total cost of a new street.

On their part, inhabitants who had paid up kept clamouring for their unmade streets to be seen to, because they had "paid the contribution". This was "an illusion", he said.