The statement from the GSD on the Bassadone International World lease, which will provide modern facilities for hundreds of public sector workers, is a demonstration that they either fail to understand the Gibraltar rental market or that they are seeking to intentionally mislead the public.

It also shows a worrying conflict of interests for Mr Bossino and Mr Azopardi in legal and political terms as they, through their law firm, represented Bassadone in the negotiation of the rental agreement.

1. First of all, the GSD is wrong to say that the Chief Minister misled Parliament in any way. In fact the Chief Minister specifically stated that the calculation he was giving Parliament was NOT the rent payable, but the rent paid to date, which included, as the Chief Minister also explicitly stated, a year rent free. This is a heinous insult by Hon Mr Bossino MP against Hon Mr Picardo KC MP and it is an allegation that should be withdrawn. In fact, Mr Bossino was not in Parliament when these questions were taken and he may not be aware of the detail of the discussion.

2. Second, the GSD are not permitted, under the rules of the Parliament, to ask for publicly available information, which, as they disclose in their statement, this rental agreement is. The document is registered and all its content is public.

3. Additionally, the rent payable in respect of this lease is the LOWEST CONTRACTED RENT the Government pays in any of its rental agreements. This is a key factor that Hon Mr Bossino seeks to ignore in his criticism. At 80a Queensway the Government will pay £28 per square foot, which is almost a pound less than the rent the Government pays anywhere else. The attack from the GSD is therefore COMPLETELY mistaken and an utter failure to understand the rental property market.

4. Moreover, in addition to the one year rent free that the Government was able to negotiate with Bassadone, the Government was also able to convince Bassadone to contribute £1,500,000.00 to the fit out costs of new facilities. That amounts to in the region of £2,500,000.00 contributed by Bassadone.

5. Finally, given that Mr Bossino has attempted to suggest that the arrangements are not value for money because of the bare calculation that the property was sold for £7.5m to Bassadone when the rent will amount to £22m, the Government can challenge even that erroneous assumption. In fact, with value released in excess of £10,000,000.00 of Government property for sale, the £7,500,000.00 of premium paid and the £2,500,000.00 of discounts negotiated, the net cost to the government over the next 22 years is just £2,000,000.00 which cements the view that this is the best property deal ever done for a rental in the recent political history of Gibraltar. This is without calculating the value of having these departments closer to each other and the rationalisation value of this as well as other synergies and savings resulting and the brilliant new space to be provided to the relevant public servants lucky enough to be moving to the new facilities.

The Chief Minister, the Hon Fabian Picardo KC MP, said: "Mr Bossino is wrong in every respect in his senseless attack. This is the cheapest rent we have bar none. It is the best deal in terms of rent free period and contribution to fit out costs. It is a deal we did with a client of his represented by him and his partners at TSN which he is now criticising in a clear conflict of interests. Not only did I not mislead Parliament, he is the one trying to mislead the public by presenting an untrue analysis of the figures. Thirteen years to the day after I first beat Mr Bossino and the GSD in a General Election, they keep trying to lie to win public support because they cannot fault our work and our negotiations. The people will continue to see through that. They will note the huge conflict of interest for Mr Bossino and Mr Azopardi, criticising the work and clients of Triay Stagnetto Neish. They will see we have done an excellent deal for public servants who we are investing in, the public and the public purse. It's time for Mr Bossino to apologise to me, but I won't hold my breath!  I have negotiated the cheapest office rental agreement for the most modern offices we have.  Now that’s a GREAT deal which Mr Bossino would not be able to achieve for our people!"