The Labour Party is putting the urgent need to combat climate change on the backburner, and is not fulfilling its responsibility to reach the 2030 EU climate change target, the PN said.
The PN said that, by doing this, the Labour Party has "not only been insulting the intelligence of Maltese and Gozitans for nine years", but in "having negotiated permission to reduce Malta's low carbon development strategy target to 19% from 36% is yet again displaying its contentment to fail to fulfil the EU 2030 climate change target," the PN said.
A press conference was held by PN MPs Robert Cutajar and David Thake, as well as PN general election candidate Janice Chetcuti,
In promising to construct "currently inexistent concrete plans" to combat climate change and ensure no further damage is done to Malta and Gozo's climate, the PN representatives said they will ensure to "fulfil their obligation towards Maltese and Gotizans and give back hope, credibility and consistency."
Robert Cutajar added that the PN will establish the, as yet, non-existing balance between development and environmental sustainability for the Maltese islands.
In this regard, he gave the example of the PL urging people to invest in solar panels, but then allowing construction to block the sunlight from reaching these people's roofs, thus rendering their solar panels useless.
The PN representatives said that the Maltese people have and will continue to be negatively impacted by climate change if the PL continues on its current track.
The PN representatives mentioned some effects that Malta is witnessing "due to the PL's inaction": An increase in asthma, farmers losing a lot of their produce due to high temperatures; sea temperature and sea levels rising - killing biodiversity.
They called out the PL for not admitting to having failed over nine years to reach Malta's 2020 climate change goals; playing with numbers - spending millions of funds that haven't resulted in noteworthy results; failing to control the islands garbage problem and having not invested in enough electric car charging stations amongst other things.
Robert Cutajar said that besides already having failed to properly distribute the EU funds towards combatting climate change, the recent €40 million announced by the government to convert Malta's public busses to solar, will only pay for about 80 buses when compared to the 400 currently in use on the island.
PN is devoid of ideas and vision - PL
Meanwhile, the Labour party said that the PN is not credible, and has not yet learned its lessons.
"The Nationalist Party is still defending the decisions that it made during the time it was in government and whose effect is still felt to this day."
"For this very reason, the PN is far from credible when it comes to the environment. A party that says that it wants to improve certain things, must first admit what could have been done better," a Labour party statement read.
Opposition spokesperson Cutajar defended the extension of the 2006 development, which was equivalent in lad size to Siġġiewi.
Reacting to Cutajar's statements, the Labour party remarked that "the primary reason he is doing this, is because he was part of the system that made these decisions and the biggest protagonists of that controversial process today lead Bernard Grech's policy."
"When talking about climate change, the Nationalist Party ignores the large number of initiatives being taken by the government. At the same time, the PN has shown that it is oblivious on how to meet targets in the fields of transport, energy, construction, waste management, water, amongst other sectors," the statement read.
The PL added that what the Nationalist Party is doing, further confirms the PN's lack of credibility as it is "not only devoid of ideas and vision, but is also unprepared."