Road to election is paved with good intentions

Few, if any, would disagree with the General Workers’ Union’s argument that political parties should not make election promises they know they are unable to keep if they are elected to power. Yet, all political parties, generally without exception, try to dazzle voters with their promises, sometimes made practically on the eve of polling day for maximum effect.

With the people’s trust in political parties now sinking to what is probably the lowest ebb (after that following the time when Labour clung to power despite a perverse election result), would the political leaders take heed of the people’s feeling in this regard or would they do what they have always done and come up with programmes gilded with promises that are more fit to be included in a wish list than in an election programme? The likelihood is that, whatever the political leaders say in the run-up to the election, they will go out of their way to impress, rather than be convincing.

Will the Nationalist Party make the income tax cut promise once again this time? When it did before the last general election, the situation was already giving signs that economic trouble was on the way. The trouble did come and the government backtracked, leaving its opponents crying foul and insisting that it ought to have played ball and honoured its promise, the more so when it had been boasting that the economy was not faring badly in the wake of the economic turbulence.

Of course, the Nationalists were wrong in making the promise but, in the face of the uncertain economic conditions that had developed subsequently, the government did well not to give in to pressure from the Labour Party and some of the trade unions to honour its promise.

So, in this case, its backtracking was well justified, though it had done wrong in raising false hopes in the beginning.

GWU general secretary Tony Zarb was reflecting the people’s sentiments, made at every election, when he was reported saying: “Those who make promises must ensure they are kept. We’re fed up of empty promises being made to workers in the run-up to an election but then not being kept”.

Labour has made one of the most important election promises yet: a reduction in the water and electricity rates, raised in the wake of the sharp increase in oil prices and, also, as part of a plan to reduce the heavy government subsidy on energy. The rise had triggered considerable anger among all classes of society, mainly because of the manner in which it had been done.

The Labour Party lost no time in promising that, if elected, it would reduce the tariffs but in doing so it has not explained yet how it would be able to do it. It merely said it would bring about greater efficiency at Enemalta and that it would work for greater economic growth. This gives the impression that Labour has a secret tariff reduction formula no other party has thought of yet.

The people have been given the impression that the tariffs would be reduced right from the start if Labour gets elected. Does the party plan to do this by raising other taxes? By how much does it plan to cut the tariffs?

Labour would be politically deceiving the electorate if it does not explain how it plans to honour its promise. It has failed to give a credible answer yet.