It is one thing for the political parties in this country to debate the publication of their sources of funding and quite another for the debate to revolve around state financing of the political parties. Twelve years after the Galdes report, commissioned by then Prime Minister Eddie Fenech Adami, the political parties seem to have been happy to let it languish at the back of a drawer, concentrate on attacking each other and, via their media empires, practise character assassination.

With a general election weeks away at the earliest, the first question that comes to mind is: why now? With Parliament still in recess, is this the right time to bring up an issue that has been left dormant for a dozen years? Does the fact that we are unaware of the major contributors to the party purses make the islands less democratic? Well, on the other hand, why not, seeing that Malta is one of only a few European states without legislation that compels the parties to open their books to public scrutiny.

To be fair, both main parties have commercial arms, which as public companies have to file their accounts, which are open to public scrutiny. But that is only one part of the story. The income side, including donations, both in terms of quantities and sources, whether in cash or kind, are kept very much in the dark, apart from the internal scrutiny of those in the highest echelons of the parties.

So, unless this is yet another smoke screen to draw attention away from embarrassing indiscretions, let the debate begin. One concept that we see in many political systems is the use of foundations as sources of funding, yet these are also open to public scrutiny and their figures are published. In the United States it is mainly presidential election campaigns that are eligible to public funding and we all know of the hundreds of millions of dollars that these campaigns cost nowadays.

What will clearly emerge from any set of figures the two main parties would care to publish is the huge drain on their finances of their television and radio stations. This black hole is justified by the huge presence and 'access' the two parties gain, to their individual advantage, to the Maltese electorate and the cost of gaining the same presence and access through other sources if those media were not available to them. This is without even entering the merits of the credibility and quality of journalism produced by these media - but then that is not their function.

So should the two main political parties decide to agree that they should open their books to public scrutiny, it is not just funding sources that we should be looking at but where those funds - both public, taxpayers' funds, if any, and private - are being spent on. Should there be a minimum amount that should be declared and a cap on single donations? Should the parties expect the state to fund them proportionally or to fund candidates, irrespective of the parties they represent?

Transparency has to go hand in hand with credibility. We have all heard of creative accounting and the 'true' financial picture even at the national, let alone party, level. The two main political parties, which have contributed to the stability of our country and shown through the alternation of power that democracy truly exists, despite having witnessed dark days, should not expect to receive a blank cheque to continue to entrench their dominance.

The electoral system is already skewed in their favour. Transparency must also go hand in hand with accountability and a certain 'ownership' that is inclusive even of those who do not wish to play the political game and simply decide on election day, based on an electoral manifesto, which party should earn their vote.