Muscat wants PN pay rise refunded in full

The Prime Minister has called on former Nationalist ministers to refund in full the pay rise they gave themselves in May 2008. PN leader Simon Busuttil should convince them to do so “as they gave the impression that they did,” a spokesman for Joseph Muscat said. According to information given in Parliament by Dr Muscat on Tuesday, about €300,000 of the €1.6 million PN ministers and parliamentary secretaries had received were returned. Yesterday, his spokesman accused Dr Busuttil of trying to hide the facts and playing with words in press conferences, to the effect that the former ministers had paid back the full amount they took “behind people’s backs”. “The former ministers who took the pay rise are now prominent in Busuttil’s shadow cabinet. They should remain politically accountable to the people,” he said. A look at former Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi’s statements in the last legislature shows the Government never said ministers and parliamentary secretaries would be refunding the bulk of their raises. In January 2011, the Government accepted to downgrade the honorarium being received by Cabinet members to pre-2008 levels and refund the difference between the two rates. This...