You may disagree with some ideas in his articles appearing in this paper but you cannot deny that what he says is never dull and most of the times stimulating. I am referring to Martin Scicluna’s regular contributions and will focus on one (May 4) under the heading ‘Ministerial feet of clay’.

In that article Scicluna dealt with the lack of preparedness of new ministers to face “their largely unfamiliar responsibilities on taking office for the first time”.

I am not a minister but I sit on the Opposition benches being elected for the first time in the last election. I stood for election the first time and I have to admit that I agree with Scicluna “that political parties should take seriously the value of development and induction training for those aspiring to office, or even those already holding office”. Such training will soften the impact on first-timers in office.

However, and without trying to challenge one iota from Scicluna’s article, I beg to make a consideration, keeping in mind the present situation made even pressing after the Panama Papers debacle involving a high-ranking minister and the Prime Minister’s own chief of staff.

I see a much more urgent need that is not limited to Cabinet members but rather to the whole gamut of our political corps. Time and time again we are observing unbecoming situations, which should be absolutely beyond the acceptable or permitted limits for all politicians. I feel that our main priority should be how to sanitise a situation which is risking to get out of hand, mostly after the powers that be at Castille handled the Panamagate (and Panama Papers) in a most abominable way.

What we hastily need is a huge positive and national campaign to put forward a basic code of ethics and get rid of this new wave of corruption that has pervaded our nation lately, but truthfully, has been with us for a long period of time. The electorate is becoming acutely sceptical by the minute.

To try to appease its conscience, government often resorts to boasting that it has passed – earlier in this legislature – legislation regarding the removal of legal prescription in cases of corruption involving politicians, the Whistleblower Act and about party financing.

But to enact laws on one hand and with the other let very grave offences to happen with impunity and to be yourself flouting the basic considerations for good governance, is tantamount to taking people for a ride and, adding insult to injury, expecting their approval.

The Panama Papers afforded the electorate the opportunity to perform a reality check on its government and one has to say they found it wanting. Prime Minister Joseph Muscat has lately been seen as desperately trying to move away from the scandal, but it is very evident that with new information always on the verge of coming out, and with his very indecisive decision about the topmost protagonists of this scandal, it won’t go away.

Scicluna quoted from Tony Blair’s autobiography A Journey. I would like to quote both from this book and from another autobiography, the one by Peter Mandelson titled The Third Man – Life at the heart of New Labour.

I do this to flag Blair’s way of doing things when faced with a similar episode to that facing Muscat in the last weeks.

We would serve the country better if all people of goodwill join forces to push forward a basic ethical code of behaviour

Mandelson was arguably Blair’s most reliable and dependable political ally – and also his best personal friend – both in opposition and in government.

Much before being made a minister in Blair’s government, Mandelson had been given a loan of £373,000 by Geoffrey Robinson (a fellow Labour MP), to help him buy a house. Mandelson said that everything was perfectly legal and the loan had no strings attached. However, he hadn’t disclosed the loan to his Permanent Secretary when taking up ministerial office. Blair writes: “That he didn’t do so was, I had no doubt, nothing to do with being dishonest.”

When a Labour source leaked the information about the loan to the media, it was soon realised it had the potential to rock the government.

Blair summoned Mandelson to show him his serious preoccupation about the case. Mandelson says: “I sensed that he thought I might have to go, especially when we finished our conversation with an agreement to ‘sleep on it’ and talk again.”

When they met the following morning, Mandelson writes that “Tony listened but his response was firm. ‘It was best for all of us’ he said, ‘that I go’. The media atmosphere was too ugly; the potential damage to the government too great if it carried on.”

On his part, Blair says that “the point was not actually one about friendship or loyalty. It was about the country”. And Mandelson adds: “Less than half a year into my first real job in government, I was suddenly, summarily out.”

In his formal reply to Mandelson’s resignation, Blair wrote: “It is no exaggeration to say that without your support and advice, we would never have builtNew Labour.”

But notwithstanding all these credits, Mandelson had to resign from Labour’s first Cabinet after 15 years of opposition during which he was a front liner in the modernisation of the party making it, once more, electable.

Mandelson was not only considered as indispensable to New Labour and the Labour government but was veritably its mind, heart and soul… and yet Blair made no bones about it and very rapidly decided that though he was not dishonest or had performed any illegality, he was guilty of being politically unethical and had to go.

Truly, the Panama scandal may be flagged as this government’s nastiest scandal so far but it definitely was preceded and followed by innumerable notorious circumstances which point to an ethical collapse in our political life.

I’m sure readers of this paper may attest to the large quantity of reports where government rules and regulations are flagrantly defied and trampled on by ministries, government departments and entities, irresponsible heads and other cronies. The sad thing is that relative competent authorities are very often seen to turn a blind eye.

Honest citizens, in turn, have only one way ahead of them, to accept resignedly that the ‘strong’ can get away with anything or, rather, with everything.

Undoubtedly, what is happening just now in our country as regards ‘good governance’ is top of the list on people’s minds. I feel that before trying to prepare politicians to take up ministerial positions with adequate training and experience, we would serve the country better if all people of goodwill join forces to push forward a basic ethical code of behaviour for all concerned and reasonably agree that we, the people, will do our utmost efforts to make all offenders are truly accountable for their actions. Not by paying lip service but by making them pay dearly with their own skin.

• On a totally different subject, I would like to publicly express my heartfelt appreciation for the solidarity shown to my husband Jean Pierre, and myself, after our cars were targeted and vandalised, lately. While reiterating once more that nothing could be gained by such attacks, I feel I have to emphasise that not only such deplorable acts will not shake my resolve, but will rather motivate me to keep working and fighting for what I believe in.

Kristy Debono is an economist and Opposition spokesperson on financial services.