The Nationalist Party has taken aim at the appointment of former Minister Justyne Caruana as a legal advisor to the Customs Department.

It was reacting to a story posted by The Shift News, which reported that the Commissioner for Inland Revenue, Joseph Caruana, defended the hiring of Caruana for a part-time position as his legal advisor, "for which she is paid €78,000 per year."

"Robert Abela's and Clyde Caruana's Government continued to defend the appointment of Justyne Caruana as a legal advisor to the Customs Department, on a salary more than three times what was initially offered when the position was publicly advertised," the PN said.

"In the original call for applications, the salary was set at €29,000. When no one applied, a direct order was issued to Justyne Caruana. But suddenly the salary was bumped up to €78,000. This was the fourth Government role given to Caruana, supposedly requiring her to work 120 hours a week and earning a total of €15,000 per month," the PN said.

"All this confirms that while the Government claims it cannot afford to pay honest workers and issues public calls with low salaries, when the same jobs are handed out by direct order to its inner circle suddenly there's plenty of money to be handed out. Labour's meritocracy and transparency have once again remained only on the billboards."