News items these past few days about the health services and the government’s plans and thoughts on education are somewhat worrying.

First we had the answer to a parliamentary question from Education Minister Evarist Bartolo who said that the government was considering changes to the plans for the construction of the new MCAST campus. This was quickly followed up by comments made by Economy Minister Chris Cardona who said that he believes that the standards set at MCAST are too high for some students.

With regard to health, we had the concerning news that the government has chosen to discontinue emergency services at St James Hospital, introduced by the previous government to reduce the workload at Mater Dei Hospital at weekends.

Let’s start with MCAST.

The Labour government’s track record on education in general, and MCAST in particular, is not good. People of my age remember the battles of the 1980s, when the then Labour government wanted to close down Church schools, university entrance was restricted to a few hundred – and a limited number of courses – and MCAST had been closed.

It is therefore quite worrying – for us parents who now have children in the same age group as we were in during the 1980s when education opportunities were at their lowest point – to hear the Education Minister hint that there will be a revision of the plans on which the previous government had embarked.

When, a few hours after Mr Bartolo’s remarks in Parliament, his colleague Dr Cardona threw doubts on the future of MCAST by saying that standards were too high there, the revision of the plans that Mr Bartolo referred to have raised even more serious questions on what the government intends to do.

What the two Labour ministers have said, put together, leads one to think that the government is considering other options for the new MCAST complex. Mr Bartolo has given an assurance that the project will not be stopped and that the European funds allocated to it will not be lost. But, on the other hand, it is of concern that the Labour government may be toying with the idea of changing the existing plans. Is it, by any chance, thinking of converting MCAST into some form of concentration of trade schools?

A Labour government did this in the past – it closed down MCAST and opened trade schools. Could it be thinking of repeating the exercise?

If so, this would not be a good idea at all. Why is it that, rather than help weaker students improve their standards, Labour thinks that the education provided is too difficult for them?

MCAST has managed to provide suitable education for post-secondary students who do not want to go to university or who do not have the qualifications to do so. It has established a good reputation over the 10 years of its existence, and student numbers – and their success – are growing. So why does Labour want, at best, to experiment with a system that is bearing fruit and, at worst, take us back three decades?

Let us also not forget that this government’s priority, when it comes to education, is not the building of a new school every year – as the previous government had done – but to carry out maintenance work on existing schools. The minister himself has said so.

One again, sadly, Labour’s policies on education leave much to be desired.

And the same goes for health services.

When in Opposition, the PL made a great deal of fuss every time there was some kind of delay in providing services offered at Mater Dei Hospital. Its TV station – One – repeatedly showed footage of patients waiting on trolleys in corridors. It seemed to imply that it had some kind of magic wand for resolving the problem, and wanted us to believe it did, when new Health Minister Godfrey Farrugia said that there were no queues at the Emergency Department, only to have to eat his words a few days later when he was called there to intervene and calm the waters when the situation got out of hand.

One of the attempts made by the previous administration to reduce the workload at Mater Dei Hospital was to reach an agreement with St James Hospital to provide an emergency service at weekends. This system had worked well, with some 180 patients a month being seen at the Sliema and Zabbar hospitals which, as a result, reduced the load at Mater Dei. The cost of treatment was paid for by the government.

Last Tuesday, however, the government announced that this service was being discontinued. It said that it was not reducing pressure on Mater Dei Hospital and was no longer feasible.

What the Labour government is saying here is that Mater Dei can handle 180 more patients during the weekend every month. When the St James’ service was operational, the then Labour Opposition criticised the overcrowding in the emergency department – and now it is saying that with 180 more patients there will be no extra pressure on Mater Dei Hospital. The mind boggles.

There is another issue – and that is cost. With the elimination of the St James’ service, the Labour government is reducing its expenditure on hospital services. It does not mind increasing the costs of its administration by €6 million to have a massive Cabinet and to invent new appointments, with all the perks, for people who do not deserve them. But it does not want to pay for a service that people were finding useful and that reduced the workload at Mater Dei Hospital.

Before the election, the PL was saying that it wanted to work hand in hand with the private sector. Six weeks later, it has broken an agreement with a private company without so much as discussing the matter with it.