Emphasis on health service in MLP mass meeting

Labour leader Alfred Sant placed a particular emphasis on the health service when he spoke at a mass meeting in the Labour heartland of Cospicua this afternoon.

A new Labour government, he said, would seek to reduce the waiting list for operations by 15 percent annually because waiting time often meant the difference between life and death for patients.

Labour, he said, would also give a new lease of life to primary health care, which has suffered greatly under the present government.

And it would be ensured that the health service remained free for everyone. This, Dr Sant said, was also something which the PN was saying, yet in the past it had considered introducing a cost element to health services.

Dr Sant strongly criticised the way how the government in the budget had promised to introduce a breast screening programme. It had made a commitment without having the necessary equipment or manpower, and this promise therefore only amounted to deception in one of the most delicate of subjects, he said.

The Labour leader said families were not living a better life under the Nationalist government. Wage increases were below inflation, the cost of living was rising, and the tax burden as among the heaviest in Europe, he said. Labour was promising to cut the power surcharge by half so as to help all families. In contrast, the PN promise to reduce income tax would only benefit those who were well off, he claimed. And reducing the surcharge would only cost a third of the tax cuts the PN was talking about.

Labour wanted the economy to grow by six percent, at which time it would also cut taxes, but in the meantime it would be removing tax on overtime.

Malta, he said, had a government stricken by corruption and inefficiency, with EU funds having been lost because of late applications.

Dr Sant also spoke on the MLP's education programme, defending the proposal to introduce a reception class before primary school. He also promised a new Junior Lyceum in the North of Malta and more resources to the University. Malta, he said, also needed schools, similar to the trade schools, to help those students who sought vocational training.

The government in a statement tonight denied Dr Sant's comments on payment for health services and said health services will remian free, and of the highest quality.