Abela and Borg agree Malta needs new mass transport system
The leaders met at the PN Headquarters for their second meeting
Prime Minister Robert Abela and Opposition leader Alex Borg agreed that both sides of the House must work together to address Malta’s traffic problem through the implementation of a new mass transport system.
This was agreed upon on Friday during a meeting between the leaders at the Nationalist Party headquarters. This meeting follows their first meeting last month at the Labour Party headquarters.
Borg opened the meeting by emphasising the importance of holding discussions that transcend partisanship to address national issues.
He appealed to the prime minister to work in cohesion with the Opposition to agree on a mass transportation plan that can effectively ease Malta’s growing traffic crisis.
In response, Abela agreed that both parties need to collaborate to achieve this goal, noting that he had already raised the matter during a meeting last month.
“We first need to agree on whether Malta needs a mass transportation system, and then on what type of system that should be,” he said.
The prime minister called on the Opposition to cooperate with the government to deliver what could become Malta’s largest-ever infrastructural project.
Robert Abela brought up talks of a metro system in April saying fresh plans for a mass transport system would be announced by the end of the year.
Plans for a €6.2 billion underground metro system serving 25 stations around Malta were unveiled just before the last general election, then quietly shelved and conspicuously left out of Budget projections in subsequent years.
Borg also brought up the PN’s private member’s bill to include the right to the environment in the Constitution, which Labour MPs voted against last week.
“If we don’t safeguard the environment ourselves, then no one will,” Borg said, urging the government to give environmental protection greater importance.
Abela, who had publicly criticised the bill by claiming it would allow foreigners to use the courts to halt village feasts, reiterated his position. Borg, however, denied that the proposed legislation would have permitted this.
Abela went on to highlight the government’s progress on Manoel Island, promising that the site will be returned to the public in the coming months and transformed into a park.
Looking ahead to Budget 2026, Abela said it would include measures aimed at improving the quality of life and called on the PN to support the budget, suggesting that minor amendments could be worked on afterwards.