A new Labour government will be committed to give more meaning to strategic alliances with multinational companies in information technology, and it would enter into talks with them, the Labour Party’s spokesman on information technology, Leo Brincat, said.

Labour wanted these companies to help Malta through their technological and digital know how, so as to beef up sectors where Malta was still weak, such as research, development and innovation, apart from urging them to help more directly in the distribution of information technology in Malta.

Mr Brincat said it could not escape notice that one of the Maltese government’s strategic partners, Microsoft, had entered into an agreement with the Greek authorities to create informatics centres to improve the country’s competitiveness and the skills of the Greek people in business development.

If such a development was possible in Greece, where internet penetration was lower than in Malta, it was even more possible here in the light of what could have been done over the years.

Before taking such steps, Mr Brincat said, it would be natural, as the Labour Party’s vision statement said, to carefully look into the cost benefits of what had been achieved to date through these alliances.