The government was dragging its feet on the introduction of a mass transportation system while Malta had the worst air quality in Europe, Opposition leader Adrian Delia said on Wednesday.

Speaking during a conference organised at the Chamber of Commerce, Dr Delia said transport was one of the island's most pressing problems.

The only thing the government had done to address this was pour tarmac and widen a few roads. 

Malta needed a real solution now, and this was clearly a mass transportation system, he said. 

The government however seemed to be using this as yet another excuse to fill the island with more foreigners. 

The solution to all of the country's problems seemed to be to import more foreign workers, he said. 

"Pensions - get more foreigners; tunnel to Gozo - get more foreigners to make it feasible. Soon we are going to be a tiny island, filled with foreigners," Dr Delia warned.

He was reacting to Prime Minister Joseph Muscat, who earlier told the same conference that a metro system would require a much larger population to be economically viable.  

The government was confusing the public with proposals that were sensational and meant only to grab votes at election time.

Importing labour is not the answer

Dr Delia said that while the country was close to full employment, the other side of the government's foreign worker-driven policies was poor remuneration.

Where people really feeling the benefits of this economic model? And were wages growing? Dr Delia said the answer was a clear no.  

If the current trend persisted, there would soon be more foreigners in the Maltese workforce than there are Maltese. This was happening on an island with limited space and even more limited resources, he warned.

Even worse, the majority of these imported workers were in low-wage sectors.

Total output may be on the rise, but this did not mean quality of life was also improving.

Asked if he would therefore try and restrict the number of foreign workers on the island, Dr Delia said he would instead come up with policies that did not depend solely on an influx of labour.

The policies he was for, would see risk spread across various economic sectors – business leaders know not to put all their eggs in one basket, he said.

Reputation damage 

The government might be planning a move into contentious areas like cryptocurrency, but this would be much more difficult if the country did not have a solid reputation, Dr Delia went on to argue.

Replying to questions put by EMCS Malta's Stefano Mallia, Dr Delia said he had lost count of the number of damning reports to slam the island’s rule of law, democratic structures, and enforcement.

Malta’s international reputation, he lamented, was shattered.

GRECO, the International Monetary Fund, and most recently MoneyVal’s preliminary assessment of the island had come back with very worrying results he said.

The island now had three months to try and improve this poor showing in the MoneyVal report-“hardly enough time to turn things around”, he said.

“So yes, let’s consider a move into innovative technologies and sectors, even if they may require some risks, but let’s ensure we have a rock solid reputation to be able to take this challenge on,” he said.

To this aim, the government should immediately implement the recommendations of the Council of Europe’s Venice Commission.

Malta a tax haven?

Reacting to a European Parliament vote in favour of a resolution labelling Malta as having the characteristics of a tax haven, Dr Delia said it was not the first time other European member states had put pressure on the island to change its tax regime.

However, when Malta had faced these challenges in the past, it had the benefit of a good reputation to hold up as a defence.

Dr Delia said he would not go around Europe tarnishing Malta or undermining the jurisdiction, but something needed to be done to fix the island’s reputation.

“As an Opposition we will not defend the government but we will defend our country, and Maltese businesses. What is wrong is wrong. We can’t live in denial, we need to get our head out of the sand,” he said.

Bloated government and the construction boom

Later during the conference, Dr Delia was asked for his views on the bloating of government with excessive public sector employment.

He said he would not go around firing people on the public payroll, but he would devise policies that saw workers only employed where necessary.

“In one year the Water Services Corporation employed 100 plasters – we really needed them,” he quipped.

Asked what about his views on the construction boom, Dr Delia said the PN was in no way dependant on the construction lobby. Its revenue streams were diverse and the party would not bend to the will of any large interests, he said.

Asked what sort of policies the PN favoured in this sector, Dr Delia said one could not plan to have no development, but could plan for sustainable development.

He concluded by saying that the government might be planning to make Malta metropolitan, but what did that really mean? Does it mean that Malta would stop being an island in the Mediterranean and become one concrete block? He asked.