GSD: “Don’t Hide Behind A Smokescreen On Housing Cases”
The GSD have issued a statement calling the Government’s recent housing press release a “smokescreen”.
A statement from the GSD follows below:
Smokescreen after smokescreen is the only way anyone can describe the Government’s latest housing press release. The Government has tried to turn an issue which was about housing the gentleman in appalling housing conditions into the irrelevant wider issue of its construction of new affordable housing which people on the medical or social housing list generally cannot buy and do not provide solutions to them today.
In its own press release on the matter Action for Housing has also called for the allocation of housing to people like Mr Lyaacoubi who they emphasised was a mere example of persons who endure appalling housing conditions.
Leader of the Opposition, Keith Azopardi said: “This is not about new estates like Hassans Centenary Terraces, Bob Peliza Mews or Chatham Views which in any event are hardly great successes. The Government announced these with great fanfare in 2017 and promised would see first completions by 2019. Those estates have seen breach of promise after breach of promise on completion dates which are now said not to happen before 2023. No keys have been handed to purchasers. Those particular failures will have disappointed hundreds of purchasers but either way it does not help Mr Lyaacoubi or similar cases on the
medical or social list get allocated housing today. It is a classic smokescreen of the worst kind. The issue is how people on the medical or social list who are today enduring appalling housing conditions are helped now.”
As the real issue is that those on the medical and social lists should be housed the question is what steps the Government is taking to do so given that only 61 from 176 allocations were from the medical and social lists in 2020.
In the only tactic that they know they seek to personalise their press release to complete the smokescreen and as usual play the man and not the ball. Mr Azopardi was last in Government nearly 20 years ago and never held the housing portfolio. It is not credible to blame him or GSD MPs for any current housing issue faced by people who are on the medical or social list in 2021. Isn’t it more likely to be the responsibility of the Government now who can actually take decisions to help these individuals? Are they seriously asking the public to believe the housing situation in 2021 is caused by the GSD Leader? On that analysis it could also be said that it is Mr Picardo’s fault because the GSLP before 1996 did not resolve the issue.
Mr Azopardi added: “Mr Picardo should stop playing political games and accept responsibility for the issues in front of him. He has been in power for nearly a decade. While he could point to the past in his first couple of years in office that tactic is now tired and worn out. People expect him to accept that he now has responsibility to deal with and resolve issues. No one else is to blame. People on the Medical and Social Lists will not believe anyone has power or responsibility to house them except those in Government. “
