Change pays dividends

There could have been no more significant day for Malta's entry into the European Union. On May Day of two years ago, we started this adventure and probably even sooner than we expected we are reaping our rewards. May 1 has for many years been an occasion to recognise the importance of productive work in our lives. Work, though of course not work alone, gives us fulfilment in our lives. It adds to our sense of purpose and enriches us as individuals because it gives us an opportunity to contribute to our community.

The reverse of this of course is the absence of work. Unemployment or the threat of it withdraws from an individual that source of fulfilment and sense of purpose which are sacrifices that aggravate the narrow financial consequences of unemployment.

An economy in transition promises people better paid jobs and more fulfilling opportunities but it also necessarily means leaving behind old habits, old comforts, indeed old jobs. Our membership of the European Union catalysed the process of change that our economy is undergoing. In a way, change is imposed on us by the circumstances around us. Globalisation and the new forces of global competition are not within our control: they are barely in anyone's control in reality. What was our choice was to prepare ourselves for this change and to face it and make the most of it.

Within a few weeks, Malta registered important successes which point to the direction we have worked for since we chose to heed our European vocation. The words of the CEO of Dubai's Tecom Investments when announcing the new SmartCity@Malta bear repeating: "I should tell you our reasons for choosing Malta. Certainly Malta's membership of the European Union was a pre-qualification in our scouting. Malta's geographical status as a peripheral island is made utterly irrelevant by its full integration in the European market and the European legislative and regulatory framework. Technology does the rest to ensure that this country's competitiveness as a location for regional headquarters is not hindered in any way, shape or form by its geographical realities." The SmartCity project is no one off. It is part of a chain of consistent investments secured through the positioning of our country within the EU, enhancing all its other inherent advantages, foremost among these our skilled and capable workforce. It is with pride that I attended HSBC's announcement of their decision to recruit 350 new people to operate an international call centre based here. These are 350 jobs that will provide productive employment, among others, to people who lost their low-end underpaid jobs that moved to less expensive countries. It would have been hard for them to see it as such when they got their dismissal notice from the old factory, but now they realise that the transition of Malta's economy is also a transition in their lives: and for them and their families this was a transition for the better.

Were it up to the Labour Party, these 350 jobs at HSBC would not have been created. Labour opposed the liberalisation of the telecoms sector. Labour described IT as "garbage in, garbage out". Labour used every opportunity to demonise HSBC quite literally as bank robbers. Labour did everything in its power to block Malta's membership of the EU. Labour mourns the passing of the old low-end economy, its proletarian unskilled and underpaid jobs and fears the onset of the new knowledge economy. The MLP thrives on fear and stagnation. For it, May 1 is an occasion to lament the past and protest the present.

For the rest of the country, May 1 is a celebration of the future which, for the new people joining HSBC and many others finding new jobs in the knowledge economy, has now become the present.