Budget 2022 is shortsighted and lacks any vision for the future, Opposition leader Bernard Grech said on Monday. 

In his first reaction to the budget speech, Grech said it lacked foresight and left people with very little in their pockets.

He admitted that there were some good measures, such as free medicines for IVF treatments, but he said the Nationalist Party has been calling for this for months.

The budget. he said, lacked a vision for important sectors such as manufacturing and financial services.

The deficit projection for next year was the same as this year's, he observed, but this year's deficit had turned out to be twice as big.

The country's debt had increased by €500 million but there was nothing to show for it. 

The budget, he observed, sidelined the pandemic front liners, nurses, educators and the police and it did not address the serious problems fishermen and farmers were facing. 

Furthermore, the budget contained no proposals to curb the cost of living. 

"People who are suffering are getting nothing. The government spent everything on corruption , consultancies and direct orders for the inner circle," he said. 

People were only getting €1.75 as a cost of living increase, but the government found millions of euro for Vitals and Electrogas, he said with reference to the privatised hospitals and the controversial power station. 

"People are being forced to work more to make ends meet. A far cry from work-life balance."

He said the pledge for free public transport was good, but he doubted that it would happen. 

And not even one euro was allocated in the budget for a study for the proposed metro. 

Grech said the government had finally admitted the anomalies in electricity bills the PN had long complained about, but the people would not get a refund of the money stolen from them. The PN, however, was reiterating its pledge to pay back the extra which people had been wrongly billed for. 

"The government is managing by crisis. It is not a credible budget because only a third of this year's budget was implemented. The PN is your guarantee of a better life and a better country," he said. 

It is clear the country needs a change in direction, he added.