The Labour party is the only ‘movement’ which can address challenges like social housing and help those struggling to make ends meet, the Prime Minister said this morning.

Joseph Muscat made this remark in a brief telephone link on Labour radio station One.

Taking a dig at the Nationalist Party, which is currently in the throes of a political crisis over its leadership race, Dr Muscat said that recent events confirmed that the PL was the only political movement capable of sorting certain pressing issues.

While welcoming news that credit rating agency DBRS confirmed its ‘A’ rating for Malta, the Prime Minister said that “sticking one’s head in the sand” and not listening to criticism would be wrong.

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Without going into details, he said government was taking measures to address the lack of spending power among certain categories of society such as pensioners, as well as social housing problems. “Though last year we doubled the subsidies, this led to a hike in rent rates, just as we feared,” he added.

In his remarks, the Prime Minister reiterated his view that a controversial sick leave proposal by the Malta Employers Association, which suggested that workers should not be paid for the first day they called in sick, was “a non-starter”.