Delia pledges to reduce electricity bills by half

Opposition Leader Adrian Delia promised that a Nationalist government would reduce electricity bills by half. Maltese families and businesses are being robbed every day, he said in an interview with The Malta Independent editor-in-chief Neil Camilleri, broadcast on the PN media.

He said that the Labour Party had won the 2013 election on the pretext of removing what it had described as a cancer factory, in reference to the old power station. They have now created a factory of corruption, he said, pledging to see that anyone involved in corrupt practices is brought to court to face justice.

Corruption must stop and anyone responsible must be punished, he said.

Delia added that he was always against the idea of selling Maltese citizenship, because it attracted unsavoury characters and opened the way for bribery. “It is not a clean investment,” he said, and served to tarnish Malta’s reputation.

Asked whether he regrets shedding his predecessor of the good governance portfolio, given the latest developments with regard to former OPM chief of staff Keith Schembri, Delia said that it is not right that sections of the media attack the PN for fighting corruption, be it under Simon Busuttil or his own leadership. A win against corruption is a win for the country and the PN, whether it’s led by Busuttil or Delia.

One by one, the PN’s fight had brought down ministers Konrad Mizzi and Chris Cardona, the Attorney General and the police commissioner, and lately also

Schembri, he said. Others will follow, he said, remarking that Prime Minister Robert Abela had his hands tied because he still used his predecessor Joseph Muscat as a consultant.

He criticised the government for the way it tackled the COVID19 situation, saying that the rushed decisions taken at the start of summer were now having devastating effects, with people dying every day. In the first months of the pandemic, we had a daily press conference on the situation. Now that the numbers are much worse, the government is not providing daily information. The people who are dying because of the virus – and as a result of the government’s bad decisions – are not being shown any dignity, he said.

He noted that the Vitals deal, which saw three public hospitals handed over to the private sector, was costing the country €250,000 every day. The Health Minister, Chris Fearne, had said that he was not part of the deal, but since he had done nothing to stop and reverse the situation, he is now also an accomplice. PM Abela had said, when he took over from Muscat, that he had commissioned a report but nine months have passed and the country is still waiting for an answer.

On migration, he said that Malta needs to change its economic model so as not to rely on population growth. The government should stop saying that the population needs to grow by 10,000 a year.

Delia said that he had submitted evidence in court that showed that the country was being robbed every day because of the deal, and yet the government had done nothing about it. So much money is being wasted when it could be used for other purposes, he said, such as to improve the wages of our educators.

Asked about his tax issues, Delia said that he had published documentation which showed that although he has €600,000 in debt, the assets that he has in his possession exceed that debt three times over. He said that his parliamentary salary is being used to maintain his children and that the sale of his law firm had provided him with other income.

He challenged both his adversary in the leadership race, Bernard Grech, and Prime Minister Abela for a debate.