Labour is now serenading private enterprise

What a difference 30 odd years make! Ask private enterprise what life under the socialist government of Dom Mintoff was like and the reply is not likely to be music to the ears of today’s Labour Party politicians.

To start with, when was the last time the PL called itself socialist? There were times when private enterprise had to set up its own organisation to fight off Mr Mintoff’s intrusions.

Labour has since metamorphosed into a party that is presenting itself as the friend of private enterprise, which is all to the good for the economy. This means that, after so many years, Labour is now determined to step into the Nationalist Party’s turf.

Labour’s new face may be attractive but it takes more than talk to convince businessmen the party has changed its policies for good. So it may take time for the business sector to warm up to the party’s political serenade.

Even so, Labour is beginning to sound more like the PN when it comes to discussing how the island can make headway in economic development. Never mind what the party’s director of communications has said in a letter in reply to Nationalist MEP Simon Busuttil over the Labour leader’s 51 proposals. His leader is sometimes far more articulate in projecting Labour’s views than he is or, at least, than the way he expressed himself in the letter.

According to the director of communications, Labour is promising enterprise, economic growth, lower utility bills, better health care, innovation in education, social welfare, less corruption and civil liberties, among other things.

It is possible to attain several of these aims but to promise economic growth at a time when Europe is reeling from so many rounds of austerity measures suggests an unimaginable degree of isolation and a surreal assessment of the economic situation as it is developing today across Europe.

A party can pledge to do its best to promote economic growth but to promise that the economy will actually expand is just like promising manna from heaven, something that no party can do.

His party leader was more careful with his words and, in a shift in policy that is marking today’s Labour from that of the past, he is suggesting that the only way in which growth can be brought about is through partnership with the private sector. Only the private sector, Joseph Muscat was reported as saying, could create the competitive framework through which wealth could be generated.

Dr Muscat is speaking of the need of a new mentality, a new leadership style to face up to the Europe of tomorrow. Even more directly, he is yearning for a new breed of politicians who, while keeping in mind the mistakes of the past, look to the future.

These are all views that are shared by all. The problem is that in the kind of political environment that both Labour and the Nationalists have shaped over the years it is becoming more difficult to attract good quality people to politics.

People have become increasingly disenchanted with politics and politicians and if today’s party leaders want a change for the better they have to mend their ways and treat the electorate with far greater respect than they have been showing it over the years.

People want to get away from the stifling political heat that the parties generate. What they yearn for is a mature political environment, not an endless fight for power.