Every now and again we get a bout of collective hand-wringing because of some survey showing that the great majority of the Maltese people haven’t read anything other than an article in Hello magazine for the past 10 years. This is usually followed by concerned noises from the authorities pledging to increase the level of literacy of the population and to leave no stone unturned in ensuring that people are encouraged to read.
Then we read that the public library may be relocated to significantly smaller premises than the ones it occupies at present. From Belt-is-Sebħ, the public library may be shifted to Old Mint Street in a building which is currently classified as a dangerous structure. This is purportedly being done in a bid to improve accessibility of the library. I don’t know about that. Old Mint Street is hardly the most happening street in the capital. It’s just as much of a hassle to navigate its steep downwards slope as it is to make it to its present location.
What’s more, there’s hardly any room for expansion down in Old Mint Street, doing away with the possibility of transforming the central library into an exciting, buzzing place rather than a silent storeroom where books go to rot.
If there is no hope for relocating the library to a really central spot, we should be concentrating on improving accessibility and features at Belt-is-Sebħ and not banishing it to Old Mint Street.
• What do you do if you’re a political party up to its neck in debt? What if you haven’t paid your utility bills since never? What if you haven’t a hope in hell in raising enough millions to dent the cataclysmic debt mountain you’ve run up because you aren’t in government and can’t dish out favours and appointments to big donors? What if you’ve spent your way to penury despite being at the receiving end of €100,000 a year by way of a State grant (Yes – the PN and the PL already receive this much. They’ve received a total of €2 million each since 1994)? What do you do then?
It seems that the issue of State funding of political parties only becomes topical for parties in Opposition
I suppose you could try a couple of pizza nights or the odd majjalata but that’s not going to rake in the big bucks. So you resort to doing what the Nationalist Party has done – asking the State to bail it out. Not in so many words, of course.
In a letter Beppe Fenech Adami sent to the Justice Minister, the PN said it agreed that the time had come for an element of State funding to also be introduced in Malta in a regulated and transparent manner and applicable to all political parties under agreed criteria. Which basically means that the Nationalist Party wants taxpayers’ money to keep it afloat.
The Labour government has turned down the proposal out of hand, despite the fact Labour spokespeople had sent out tentative feelers about it in the past.
It seems that the issue of State funding of political parties only becomes topical for parties in Opposition. Which goes some way in proving the point that parties in power don’t really bother with State funding because they receive donations in return for handing out the appointments, perks and other taxpayer-funded largesse.
The argument for State funding of political parties is that it would put them on a level playing field and not so dependent on big donors which they would then favour. I’m not so sure it would work out that way. After all, the existence of State funding in other countries such as Italy and Germany has certainly not stopped politicians from getting embroiled in financial scandals. And how would we ensure that there is a fair distribution of State funds?
What’s to stop the PN and the PL from giving themselves State funding and denying it to other parties (as happens right now)?
More to the point, why shouldn’t political parties sink or swim on their own, without being helped by the State? Our own limited experience with State funding shows that both the major political parties have made a balls up with the cash that flowed their way. Why should we give them more of it?
cl.bon@nextgen.net.mt