Prime Minister Robert Abela said that he doesn't agree that public funds should be used to pay for the debt of political parties.

"That is what others want as they don't have solutions for their problems," Abela said, speaking during a political activity in Zejtun on Sunday.

Earlier this year, PN MP Adrian Delia had issued a post on social media, saying: "Political parties are essential to the running of the country. Like other NGOs they must be helped to fulfil their role in an efficient, transparent and accountable way. We need rules that introduce substantial government funding while putting limits on private donations." Before being elected leader of the PN, Alex Borg had reportedly indicated that he was not averse to the idea.

Abela, speaking on Sunday, said: "We believe in prudence and that a political party must be able to sustain itself. We will not burden families with a new weight to pay for the lack of prudence of others. If they borrowed and got into debt, they need to solve it. We believe there is far better use for people's money."

Abela also said that the Labour Party is not afraid of publishing its audited account, "unlike others," in what was a reference to the PN. He said that it is the PL's duty to publish them. "Others don't honour their obligations that emerge from the party financing law," he said.

"We all know what happened to those who believed Simon Busuittil years ago regarding the Cedoli. Next year, they are supposed to pay them the money back, instead they said that with agreement they will push them forward."

He said that Bernard Grech said his legacy would be to pay the Cedoli. "Instead, the first action of the one who came after him was to push it forward."   

"Not even in opposition do they implement what they promise. Imagine if they were in government. How can you trust a party with the people's money that is not even able to take care of the money of its own members."

Abela during his speech announced that he is the first Prime Minister in the country's history to say that it has the lowest unemployment rate in the EU.

He said that in 2012 Malta was the second worst country when it came to the creation of jobs.

He said that his predecessor, Joseph Muscat, made huge steps forward in this regard, and managed to reach the lowest number of people registering for work in history. "Despite the challenges we faced, including the pandemic, I and my government managed to improve it. Today we have a third less registering for work than we had in January 2020."

This, Abela said, shows how strong the country's economic machine is.  "Others say our model creates cheap labour for foreign workers. But official statistics show that over the past ten years we created work for Maltese more than they were able to in 30 whole years." He said that 8 of every new 10 jobs "we created are in technical, management or professional jobs."

Abela said that the median wage in the last ten years rose by €10,000.

Instead of Maltese youths going to the UK to look for jobs, now children of English people are coming to Malta to work here, he said. "We welcome them as they welcomed us. We have the most dynamic economy in the EU. We had a confirmation by S&P this past week. They said Malta remains on track to soon exit the excessive deficit procedure."

"It also said we were able to reduce the need of foreign workers by half."

"What S&P said about Malta happened in same context that larger countries like France were given a downgrade. And they gave us the best rating we've had as they believe our economy will remain best in Europe."

He said that under a Labour Government, from 2013 to today, Gozitan and Maltese families benefited from €820 million in tax cuts, as well as from almost one and a quarter billion euro in income tax and stamp duty on property.

He said that economic development is taking place alongside major investment in green and open spaces for families. Abela announced that next week the first consultation with children will be held so that he can hear how they would like the national park at White Rocks to be created.

He said that a Labour Government will leave a legacy in which, once White Rocks, Manoel Island, and Fort Campbell are returned to the people, the protected land and parks in Malta as a percentage of the country's total area will be more than those in Germany, and one and a half times those in Denmark, he said.