Who's superficial then?

Quote: "We had no plans not to issue the legal notice." The double negative employed by the Prime Minister tells us a lot about this government's crumbling confidence. On the matter of providing legal assistance to suspects under interrogation, Lawrence Gonzi was forced to act as quickly and as painlessly as possible. While not wanting to be seen bowing - yet again - to the opposition, to some of its own MPs and to popular pressure in general, as happened with the St John co-cathedral project episode, the government continues to cave in under the weight of its own contradictions.

This was a very avoidable administrative calamity, if only the government was not adrift and was instead dealing with issues before being devoured by them. For those of you who are not in sync with this particular bout of prime ministerial wavering, it is about the introduction of the afore-mentioned legal aid, agreed to unanimously by Parliament in 2002. The provision has thus featured in the Criminal Code for the past seven years but the legal notice necessary to enforce it was never issued. This, even though various European Court of Human Rights judgments affirmed this right to legal counsel.

When recently pressed again to take action - the matter has been brought up several times in various fora over the years - dust was blown off the long-avoided law and the government said that the necessary legal notice would be introduced later on this year once the police had DNA-testing equipment available.

Should the opposition have just stood and gaped in astonishment at such ineptitude? Taking into account the many instances in which MPs have spoken and written on this issue, and considering seven years of government procrastination as unacceptable, the PL gave notice of a parliamentary motion calling for the immediate publication of the necessary legal notice.

Consequently, knowing that if the motion came to the vote the government would lose it, since there was also internal PN dissent on the issue, the Prime Minister finally gave the order for the said legal notice to be published. And, no, of course it had nothing to do with the pressure put on by opposition and government MPs, we are told like little children. To which we reply in kind: Full marks for instinctive mendacity.

What is interesting to observers of political discourse, and what is so revealing of the Prime Minister's current frame of mind, is his attitude in this umpteenth damage-limitation corner he has painted himself in. How does he diffuse the situation? By declaring his "amazement at the superficiality of the Labour Party". And I am amazed at how the Prime Minister can think that people with their head screwed on in the right direction don't see through him.

There's nothing wrong with the Prime Minister adjusting matters according to the situation; he has no option but to try and do that. What isn't right is to point at the opposition making accusations of superficiality. Actually, "superficial" is a good word to describe the Prime Minister's hasty arrangement to issue the legal notice now, the main intention being to render irrelevant the opposition's motion. If his concern was real, this legal notice would have been in place years ago. What is important though is that the PL's motion served its objective in spurring the government to finally take action, this time even faster than hoped for. While the Prime Minister's behind-the-scenes lobbying amounts to little more than dithering and looking for scapegoats to avoid further dents to his skilfully-manufactured "safe pair of hands" image (remember that slogan?), he leaves us with no choice then but to swing the spotlight on to his Olympic displays of indecisiveness. He had done it in the St John co-cathedral project debacle when Dr Gonzi finally had to say that he would be turning back because the issue was "dividing the people" rather than admitting it was actually splitting his parliamentary group and, again, like this time, if the motion was discussed in Parliament, the government would have lost the vote.

Having a government walking constantly on a tight rope isn't good, for obvious reasons. We've been there, in this one-seat majority business, albeit with 7,333 votes (over two quotas) as compared to this government's 1,580 votes (half a quota). But that's by the by. We have to address today's reality, which includes a problem in the form of a pusillanimous Cabinet, which is delivering less and less. A government that has not only run out of money and ideas but is also low on courage to say things as they are while the spells of blundering become more frequent.

Dr Dalli is shadow minister for the public service and government investment.