A new Nationalist government will tackle health by investing in infrastructure, the workers and patients, Nationalist Party leader Bernard Grech said on Wednesday.
Interviewed on Net, the party’s television station, Grech said the Labour government had failed in the health sector.
It forked out the money that had to be invested but what had to be done was not done.
“They sold the people’s health,” he charged.
The people, he said, had to know what was going to be done in the sector but Prime Minister Robert Abela had neither the interest nor the will or intention to address what the people wanted.
A PN government, Grech said, will continue to invest in Mater Dei for the hospital to continue to function in the best possible way.
It was not acceptable for patients to be cared for in a store, a library or the staff canteen, he said.
A PN government will also invest in infrastructure for mental health to keep younger people closer to the community. Malta’s sole mental health hospital was in a disastrous state, there was no dignity for workers or residents and the would build a mental health hospital close to Mater Dei.
It would also invest in a much-needed hospital in Gozo and will make the best use of the other hospitals in the country, including St Luke’s which had been left to deteriorate.
A PN government would in all staff working in the health sector, as they were the people giving the service. It would invest in patients by making sure there was state-of-the-art technology and it will keep investing even when it comes to medicine.
Getting more efficient medicine was long-term investment, reducing the future expense in health.
Environment
On the environment, Grech said the government had expanded the economy only through an extraordinary importation of people.
This had increased the burden on infrastructure and the need for buildings, pushing prices sky-high to the detriment of Maltese youth. It was also leading to unbridled construction.
While development could not stop, Grech said, the Planning Authority had to be a real planning authority and not a development authority. It had to come up with a plan for where the country was heading.
He promised that a Nationalist government will include NGOs on the decision-making table. “NGOs are the counterbalance of the country’s leaders so we want them with us,” he said.
The PN, he said, wanted 10 new economic sectors for the country, none of which would be a burden for the country.
He also reiterated the PN’s promise to set up a €40 million national fund to help Maltese entrepreneurs cushion the exorbitant transportation costs eating away at their competitiveness.