The speech the Minister of Finance delivered on Monday was not, as expected, so much a budget speech as a rallying call for the Nationalist Party for the coming general election, and for the deputy-leadership contest the Minister, Tonio Fenech, was about to face. Take the second version first irrespective to the contest outturn.
Not a word about the size of the ballooning public debt- Lino Spiteri
In canvassing for his election the Minister’s rival MEP contestant made great play about his claim that he had written the 2008 Nationalist Party electoral programme, and would be doing the same for 2013. To put it mildly, that claim, though perhaps factual, was over the top and misleading.
Those of us familiar with drafting manifestos know that a programme is never one man’s work. It is a pooling of various ideas, reflecting experience and new ideas. When it comes to putting the pool together, it is not uncommon for the drafters to decide that there should be a single drafter, to ensure continuity and style above all.
They select the draft consolidator for his writing skills and still go through and make amendments to his draft. I won’t take easy bets that this is what happened in 2008, and what will happen in 2013.
The single drafter still has an onerous task, to give body, soul and a moving narrative to the draft. But to claim he “wrote” the document, in the sense of having created it, is too gross a boast.
Fenech could not counter that publicly, given that the contest was promoted as one between warm friends. He allowed his reply to come through the budget speech, coinciding with its principal party objective.
As sure as not, he too was working on draft sections prepared by others, but he put them together and cemented them with his own mix. He wanted the speech to say one thing – this is what the Nationalist government did since 2008, and it was I, Tonio Fenech, who did it through the execution of the Budget Estimates.
Fenech spent the whole of his time drumming the point of how much had been carried out over close to five years. He was setting out the juicy parts of the Nationalist record, ignoring those parts where the Budget 2008 promises failed to materialise.
This was his day and Fenech made a grand dinner of it, appearing big in Parliament and big on television, snazzy suit, light make-up, good delivery and all. He held the attention of ministers and backbenchers in a packed house and, when he sat down could comfortably feel he had done a good political job.
The broader point is, had he done the best possible job as Minister of Finance and the Economy? The answer, I think is, not quite so. Fenech presented a strange sort of budget speech. He barely found time to touch on the macroeconomic indicators which are being followed with eagle eyes.
His technique was to paint the background against which the local economy in the form of possibly the bleakest global economy ever. He saluted the fact – a positive fact, it must be said – that the local economy has survived the grave hazards and, on a net basis, has done reasonably well. He gave this account through micro analysis to recall the micro measures he had introduced in recent years and to spell out their success.
He talked of jobs here and there but failed to mention that unemployment has been steadily growing for months and has now topped the critical 7,000 figure.
After 25 years of weeding out malingerers, he could not say that the figure was overblown. So he just ignored it. Similarly, he did not assess and highlight the figures of the Budget for 2012 and, remarkably, not even those for 2013.
Again he treated 2013 on a micro basis. Against a background of a worsening global situation he detailed a continuation of more micro measures without indicating that he had a macro policy to turn to if the external situation deteriorated more than forecast. He reeled off statements as if Malta was immune to the virus attacking the outside world. Not a hint of contingency measures. Rather, some dishing out, like extending students stipends to those who had already graduated.
Not a word about the size of the ballooning public debt, about the demands that will be bade upon it in the year ahead. The figures are buried in the Estimates for those who want to spoil the party by looking at them.
There were things the Finance Minister could talk about with confidence, aside from the cruel fact that the 65,000 people at risk of poverty got practically nothing meaningful from him. And moving forward there are good micro proposals which should help the large micro economic sector.
But there is no hint of a plan should forecasts go wrong. Borrow more. Pay on the never never. And let the devil – the new 2013 government – take the hindmost.