Malta’s financial services sector is coming under “savage attacks which give no quarter” due to the success it is achieving, Finance Minister Edward Scicluna said yesterday in Parliament.

A case in point was the unethical methods used by a Wall Street Journal reporter to obtain information on Bank of Valletta’s intentions regarding frozen ac-counts from the Gaddafi family.

Winding up the debate on the Bill amending various financial services laws, Prof. Scicluna reiterated that Malta was adhering to UN decisions and had frozen the Gaddafi family’s assets, but the WSJ had unashamedly sought to besmirch a leading Maltese bank’s name.

This could have scared potential investors who were not familiar with Malta’s banks and demonstrated the need for the government and Opposition, together, to look after the country’s financial institutions and banks and protect them from attack.

Of course the Opposition had every right to criticise, but there was genuine criticism and criticism that sought to undermine the government’s style of doing things with the European Commission.

Such criticism was sometimes more ferocious on top-priority projects such as Electrogas, the proposed American University of Malta and Barts School of Medicine. The huge demand for such services would create a new type of year-round tourism.

Prof. Scicluna said that the Bill would lead to a roadmap on how to proceed on banks and financial institutions passing through difficult times.

He hoped it could be followed up soon with another Bill setting up a financial arbiter to give consumers redress.

He was sure this would stoke a hot discussion among financial institutions but this void needed to be filled.