So he’s serious, he – Joseph M, that is – really is going to sell off the family silver. Or rather, in government parlance, he is offering Maltese citizenship to any foreigner who can afford the extortionate sum of €650K.

Not a bad bit of business if: (1) he can get away with it, and (2) if he can find enough alien mugs, Arab sheiks, lottery winners, drug barons, Russian oligarchs, high-living, free-spending German bishops and assorted money launderers to comply with the – apparently – generous terms and conditions.

Great! Fantastic! Wonderful! Goodbye national debt, hello equable balance of payments. In one fell swoop our PM has solved all Malta’s fiscal and economic problems for the foreseeable future. From here on in, we can all bask in the warm glow of indefinite prosperity.

But why stop there? Why stop with the citizenship gimmick? Our leader’s enterprise could open up a whole new can of worms... I mean, realm of possibilities.

Just think, all our new Maltesers could then legally buy property here... please! And not just any old property; the luxury dwellings market would go through the roof. Palazzos with pools, rural castellos, mega-villas designed by Renzo Piano... with interiors by Lawrence Llewelyn-Bowen. They could, hopefully, invest heavily in many aspects of our economy.

The Russians may fancy buying a football club or three; the Chinese would, almost certainly, lead the way in oil prospecting; the Arabs might seriously update our sex industry; while the Colombians are uniquely equipped to raise the profile of the illegal drugs trade. And very importantly, they could all greatly enhance our gene pool, by bringing in lots of Slavic, Latino, Arab and Chinese genetic material.

Oh yes, I’m feeling good about the deal already. I mean, who wouldn’t want to be Maltese? We are, after all, probably the most important people on the planet... at least we think we are. And I repeat, who wouldn’t want to share a nationality with such stellar Maltese citizens as Iċ-Ċaqnu, Chiara, Austin Gatt, Manuel Mallia... the list goes on.

Give each new citizen the chance to buy a piece of our islands as their very own personal fiefdom

And – suspecting that most of the individuals who cough up the readies to become Maltese won’t possess miniscule egos, why not go even further down the road to Gomorrah and offer a deal most of them could never refuse. Give each new citizen the chance to buy a piece of our islands (Admittedly there’s not a lot left available to sell) as their very own personal fiefdom.

We don’t have to flog them very much, a square metre would do, a piece of their very own sovereign territory, administered solely by each new citizen. This would allow him or her to become monarch, or president, or dictator of... whatever they decide to call their newly acquired piece of our land. The People’s Republic of Abramovichova maybe, or The Lairdom of Stamford Bridge. I would suggest we begin by parcelling up Filfla; then – if business is good – move on to Cominotto, Comino, and finally, when the boom kicks in, Gozo.

Each new head of state would need to set up an offshore office in say, Valletta, Sliema or the Three Cities; another golden chance to cream off some more of their readies... brilliant!

But I’m afraid the authorities have missed a trick when they decided to charge each new citizen just €25K for each wife and dependent. Just think, some of these wealthy Arabs would come with a whole harem plus all their kids. We could have really cleaned up if we’d stung them for a lot more. But maybe we could make up the difference in school fees or something.

This is all fine and good if the members of this new breed of ‘Maltese’ are actually going to physically spend some time here. But I suspect that once citizenship has been granted to these mega-rich expats... we won’t see their backsides for dust. The granting of Maltese citizenship will be just another way to legally dodge tax, launder money or both.

This is one instance where I sincerely hope I am proved wrong.