Figures issued by the National Statistics Office on Friday confirmed the surge in the cost of living the country is experiencing, Opposition leader Alfred Sant and MLP finance spokesman Charles Mangion said in a joint statement yesterday.

They pointed out that a week ago they had expressed the MLP’s disappointment that a meeting of the Malta Council for Economic and Social Development (MCESD) had not made a detailed analysis of the causes of rising living costs, nor put forward proposals to rein it in.

They insisted that the rising costs were not all imported and Malta therefore needed a proper market surveillance mechanism.

Dr Sant pointed out that costs had risen 2.9 per cent year-on-year as calculated by the EU harmonised price index. When one removed the impact of hotel costs, which formed part of the EU index but did not affect the ordinary Maltese man in the street, one discovers that the rise in prices was actually much steeper.

According to the Maltese index, which did not include the drop in hotel prices, the cost of living in November rose by 3.3 per cent year-on-year. And it was essential items such as food, clothing and health that had seen some of the steepest increases, they said.

It made no sense to argue that the increase in the cost of living was imported when increases here were double the European average and more.

They also asked how prices had risen in Malta when the government said it had reached price freeze agreements with importers.

Dr Sant and Dr Mangion urged the government to investigate the real causes of the current situation and to ensure that the people’s purchasing power was protected, especially as Malta moved to adopt the euro.