EU membership, five years on...

In five short years of EU membership, Malta has witnessed what is perhaps its most significant political, legal, economic and social change since independence.

And even if we may not care to realise, this has affected us too. In our daily lives.

Just take a look around and see for yourself.

The currency in your pocket is a world currency and your Maltese euro coins circulate freely as legal tender in 16 countries.

Your passport gives you equal rights in 30 European countries where you can freely travel, reside, work, do business, study or train.

Travelling has become far easier and far cheaper. Low-cost travel has become the rule, passport controls have been lifted in the EU and even the US visa has been removed.

You now can hardly live without your mobile and your internet. Before membership mobile users were the exception. Now they are the rule. And it is non-users who are the exception. A sizable majority of Maltese households have access to the internet and increasing numbers, including the not-so-young, have become avid surfers.

Whether it is travelling, telephony or even your daily shopping, it is clear that, as a consumer, you now have a far greater say and a far greater choice.

We are no longer a market of half a million, but a market of half a billion. That has translated into more local and foreign investment, in new and higher value-added sectors and in more jobs. That has turned us into a different economy, more open, more diversified, with a better educated workforce and therefore better able to compete.

EU funding and EU programmes have changed people's lives. Many of you know someone who benefitted. Just ask them.

As a result, unemployed people have been able to get a new chance to integrate into the working world. More and more students have been able to study abroad and many have been able to get new work experiences both in Malta and abroad.

Funding is being pumped into the environmental sector which, thanks to membership, has finally become a national priority. In the transport sector, we have started to redress the infrastructural deficit of our road network which, admittedly, remains a sore point. On both these counts, I believe that we have not progressed as rapidly as people expected. But on the positive side, these two sectors are getting the lion's share of Malta's EU financial envelop in the years to come.

Significantly, Malta has established itself among the best in terms of using EU funding, although that does not mean that we can relax.

In terms of your rights, European laws and standards are now part of our legal system, giving you an unprecedented opportunity to stand up for your rights and even the right to challenge your own government by taking your complaint to the European forum. This, in itself, is spurring our public administration to get its act together and to deliver what is rightfully yours.

In short, the world has become smaller and we are safely plugged into it. Or almost.

You will not be surprised that mine is a positive assessment. But that does not mean that I think that it is enough. Or that we should be satisfied.

We can still do more and we can still do better. But we are on the right track.

On a number of counts we continue to lag behind European standards and we must catch up. Law enforcement, for instance, remains a weak point, with the public administration often lacking sufficient resources to get into shape or otherwise too slow to act, if at all. There is also an equally disturbing public resistance to the discipline that comes with meeting higher standards.

In terms of exploiting the EU market we can also do better. Many more entrepreneurs need to broaden their outlook and think in terms of the wider EU market beyond our shores rather than limit themselves to localised sectors that have long shown signs of saturation, such as retailing.

And at a time when the world is facing a major economic crisis, EU membership becomes more, not less, relevant.

Other countries face soaring unemployment, ballooning deficits, mounting debts and even social unrest. Iceland, until recently rated among the richest countries in the world, faces economic collapse and is now turning to EU and euro membership for refuge.

In the face of these challenges, the need to use EU membership as a tool to stay afloat and to prepare ourselves for the rebound becomes even more compelling.

This is not to say that Europe has provided all the answers.

On some issues, chief among which is immigration, we have found, at our expense, that European solidarity stopped short at financial support. When we needed more we found that a European policy still needed to be developed to provide common solutions to what is essentially a common challenge. In turn, we have contributed constructively to help shape this fledgling policy every step of the way.

Five years on, we have truly moved on. True, they have been hard years of adaptation. But we have been resilient, we have benefitted and we seen positive results.

There is no reason to believe that, having learnt the ropes, we should not do even better. I am confident that we can do so.

Yes, we can.

A limited number of seats are still available for Friday's national conference EU Membership: Five Years On. If you wish to attend, call on 2122 8585 or send an e-mail to info@simonbusuttil.eu

Dr Busuttil is a Nationalist member of the European Parliament.