The Nationalist Party gave Labour a taste of its own political rhetoric today, accusing it of 'being negative' after its reaction to the PN's pre-budget document, issued last week.

The shadow minister for finance, Mario de Marco, said the document had been widely well received, except for Joseph Muscat, who yesterday said it included contradictory statements. 

Instead of examining the detailed economic analysis made in the document, Dr Muscat had turned negative, the PN said. 

READ: PN opposes rent controls as it unveils its pre-Budget document

It stressed that the underlying message of the document was that economic growth needed to be translated into fair distribution of wealth. 

Referring to public expenditure, the PN said Labour was trying to give the impression that public sector recruitment was mostly in the education and health sectors, But this was not true.  

The Labour government was also trying to give the impression that taxes had not risen. Yet, excise duty, paid by everyone on essential, everyday items, had gone up.  

As for social housing, the PN observed that a backlog of 2,773 requests for housing before the Housing Authority had risen to 3,503 last year, an increase of 26%.