Updated | Government accuses PN of scaremongering workers

Not enough jobs were being created to meet the demand of people looking for a job, PN MP Mario de Marco said.

Flanked by PN MEP candidate Helga Ellul, de Marco reiterated the Opposition's call for an action plan on job creation.

"We are concerned that, after 11 months in government, Labour has failed to launch a series plan of action. We welcome the incentives encouraging more people to join the workforce. But such incentives are useless if there are no places of work available," he said.

Acknowledging that the rate of employment increased by 5,000 people in 2013, de Marco said the situation was not yet alarming.

"The indicators however show that not all is rosy. Jobs are being created but not at the rate at which people looking for employment increase," he said.

"Edward Scicluna was quick to spin the recent spate of negative economic indicators and point out the only positive indicator emerging form yesterday's NSO trade data," De Marco said.

Moreover, the PN Deputy leader accused Scicluna of omitting "significant" pieces of information and failed to refer to a decrease in the importation of industrial supplies and durable goods and to a decline in exports.

"The government should drop its spin and focus on creating jobs as it appears content to either sweep these figures under the carpet or, at the other extreme, actually attempting to distort the data as positive. This will certainly not provide any comfort or solution to the 7,400 unemployed persons," he argued.

Compared to 2012, there were 600 more people registering for work during 2013.

Although still relatively low, the rate of unemployment according to Eurostat has increased to 6.7% from 6.4%.

He said it was worrying that the country lost the opportunity of a foreign pharmaceutical company investing in Malta, opting to invest in Iceland.

Other indicators that flagged concern were the NSO data on import and export. According to de Marco, the 9% decrease in imports and the 13% decrease in exports did not augur well for business and industrial production.

'Opposition is scaremongering workers' - Government

In a reaction, the government has hit out at the opposition's criticism and blamed it of scaremongering workers.

"Rather than scarremongering workers of a factory announcing job cuts and boasting of previous job figures, the opposition should remember that under the previous Nationalist administrations, 2,262 full-time manufacturing jobs were lost, more than one a day," the government argued.

The government also said that PN is not taking into account the figures of the Labour Force Survey showing an annual increase of 1.7% in the rate of employment at the end of the third quarter.

While acknowledging that it is a tall order for Malta to reach Scandinavian employment figures, the government pointed out that Malta now ranks seventh from last in the rate of employers, up by four places.

Moreover, in reaction to the opposition accusing the government of "distorting the results to give the impression that the data is positive," the government insisted that the creation of job opportunities remains at the top of its agenda.