Malta’s families and health care services are to be at the heart of the government’s plans for the future, and are to be given a special focus now that the feat of reining in public finances has been accomplished, Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi said yesterday evening.

Health care and family were the order of the day yesterday evening as Dr Gonzi hosted the fourth public dialogue meeting in the lead-up to Thursday’s Independence celebrations.

The Malta Independent journalist Francesca Vella interviewed Dr Gonzi – as well as Family and Social Solidarity Minister Dolores Cristina and Health, Elderly and Community Care Minister Louis Deguara – at the Floriana Granaries as part of the government’s Families Growing Stronger theme.

Evidently in electoral mode, Dr Gonzi expounded upon the work the government has done in the areas of health care and the family.

And such work, he said, is being turned up a notch in the near future, now that the country’s financial house is in order and that the government’s work over the last three years is bearing fruit.

“Now that we have brought the country’s finances onto a sound footing – as confirmed by the European Commission and the International Monetary Fund – we will be doing the same for Malta’s families,” Dr Gonzi stressed yesterday evening.

In terms of health care, Dr Gonzi, with his wife Kate and Nationalist Party secretary general Joe Saliba seated on either side, observed how even before the opening of the Mater Dei hospital, the quality of Malta’s health care services had been ranked the world’s fifth best.

Dr Gonzi also had words of praise for Malta’s doctors, nurses and other health care professionals – whom he described as among the best in the world, and whom he publicly thanked for their “priceless work”.

Most people did not realise that Malta spends Lm1 million per week on health care, Minister Deguara remarked, nor the great strides the country has taken over recent years.

But, he added, Malta’s growing and ageing population presented future challenges.

The Mater Dei hospital, he said, represents the tip of the iceberg that is Malta’s vision for the future in the area of health care services, which include further investment in the country’s primary health care system, rehabilitation centres and homes for the elderly – as well as the 2015 goal of becoming a Mediterranean health care centre of excellence.

Such matters, he stressed, were not electoral pledges but rather a long-term, carefully developed plan for eh country’s future.

While acknowledging that some of the criticisms of Malta’s primary health care system have perhaps been justified, he added the government was also investing in and revamping the area.

A public consultation process on Malta’s primary and community health care systems and services would begin toward the year’s end, with a view to establishing what, exactly, the Maltese wanted from such services, he said.

Minister Cristina, meanwhile, paid heed to the fact that Malta’s children are to be given special attention, including a review of the children’s allowance in the upcoming budget.

The government’s public housing schemes, which she said were being mimicked by the opposition, were also proving popular and of great assistance to first time buyers in particular.

In the meantime, she added, housing estates were being continually embellished in terms of gardens and other public spaces.

Equity sharing schemes had proved beneficial, she said, while the shared ownership scheme was a “tremendous success” with some 450 families having already taken part.