Investment Minister Austin Gatt said Labour’s IT spokesman, Leo Brincat, was trying to deny “rumours” that Labour in government would call a halt to the strategic alliances the government has established with multinationals in IT. But the rumours had been spread only by Mr Brincat himself, and the Labour Party, who for six years have been denigrating the alliances the government has with these multinationals, describing them only as gimmicks.

The first time Mr Brincat had come out harshly against strategic alliances was in 2003 when the government and Microsoft Corporation distributed licensed copies of software to Maltese students at a nominal price.

Ever since then, every government initiative with its strategic allies, Microsoft, HP, IBM, Cisco and SAP had either been ignored or were lambasted.

It was this behaviour which clearly implied that Labour in government would cut off all relations with IT multinationals, Dr Gatt said. Mr Brincat was now seeing how wrong he had been, though he was not admitting the government’s achievements through these alliances.