Since my time at University studying economics, I have been fascinated, or rather intrigued, by the whole process and workings of our national budget. I hardly ever imagined that in the not-so-distant future I would have had the opportunity to analyse the Budget and speak about it from close range in Parliament.

I followed all the discussions regarding the 2017 Budget and contributed with my interventions in the parliamentary debate on the estimates of various ministries – digital economy, economy, finance, transport and tourism.

Here I will focus on the speech made by Opposition leader Simon Busuttil, which I describe as constructive, moderate and analytical, touching upon the main issues of the well-being of all Maltese. I will focus on two points in that speech which are somehow interlinked.

Busuttil pledged to withdraw the €360 million Electrogas State guarantee and instead channel it into a massive guarantee scheme for start-up enterprises, placing small businesses and new ideas at the forefront of an economic transformation.

The second point is about the lack of new economic sectors which the government intends to invest in to allow new areas to take over if existing ones fall behind. As an example, Busuttil mentioned the FinTech (emerging technology and financial services) sector, which can be tapped by our country, and gain advantage after Brexit.

Let’s begin with start-ups. A few weeks ago, I attended once again a very fruitful conference organised by EY during which the results of the EY Malta Attractiveness Survey 2016 were revealed. In this survey, start-ups are described as key drivers of every economy as they provide multiple benefits through job creation, innovation and growth.

The survey says Malta is becoming increasingly successful as a start-up location through successive tailor-made initiatives and incentives aimed at encouraging start-ups. The same survey found that 66 per cent of Foreign Direct Investments (FDI) sources believe Malta is an attractive start-up location.

This goes to underline how sensible Busuttil’s proposal is to give massive assistance to all those mainly young entrepreneurs who are confident, adventurous and tenacious enough to set up new ideas and find such a helping hand in the first few steps towards successful and fruitful ventures.

The EY survey lists the sectors that are most attractive as a start-up location in Malta: financial services (88 per cent); iGaming (81 per cent); ICT & Telecoms (55 per cent); digital media and games (53 per cent); aviation (48 per cent); banking (40 per cent); maritime (37 per cent); manufacturing (16 per cent); logistics (16 per cent); real estate, infrastructure, construction (16 per cent); power, utilities, renewable energies (11 per cent); oil and gas (seven per cent); others (three per cent).

This inevitably leads me to the second point in Busuttil’s speech. A quick glance at the above classification shows that, practically, the first five sectors are those which previous Nationalist governments – with the help of many others, including the Opposition of the day – succeeded to develop in order to diversify our economy and, thus, will not be dependent only on a limited number of age-old sectors, which though being fruitful and successful in their prime, may not have remained so in the future.

It is very typical of this administration to commit government’s finances according to party political exigencies and not those of the country

For example, if we take the remote gaming sector, and quoting again from the EY survey, this is the sector that respondents believed will drive Malta’s growth in the future. However it is still considered to be a relatively easy sector to also leave Malta’s jurisdiction.

In its report EY says that ICT and telecoms are seen by existing investors to be important for Malta in the future as are areas in the wider financial services field.

But EY adds a very important recommendation. It says that Malta’s experience in these areas has to be emulated in new sectors which “have been on the radar for the last few years”, including FinTech, commodities trading, logistics, other ancillary offerings for Asian e-commerce, and sustainable transport solutions.

On the issue of new economic sectors, it may be very relevant to see what experienced and respected economist Joseph F.X. Zahra had to say on this subject. After stating that any state budget should form part of an overarching strategy for a country, he commented on the heavy dependence on property development, construction, the Individual Investment Programme (IIP), international business, especially iGaming, saying they are volatile, cyclical and definite.

Zahra posed a very relevant question: “What happens if we are blowing up a property bubble?” And he quickly adds that the stage we are in reminds him of Ireland and Spain pre-2008.

As a diligent economist, Zahra offers a timely solution: “With the wealth that has been accumulated, I would have liked to hear more about the creation of new economic sectors that will take us forward to the next 20 years.”

This tallies perfectly with what Busuttil advocated in his Budget speech and also with what was stated in the PN’s pre-Budget document, where we observed that Malta is failing to create new economic/business sectors.

If I had to pinpoint one of the main pillars of Malta’s undisputed economic success in the last 30 years, I will readily conclude that it was the ability of successive Nationalist governments to determine particular niches and in most cases to scoop and outwit potential competitors.

One can shortlist a number of such sectors – financial services, ICT, iGaming, digital media, aviation services, pharmaceuticals – which were developed and, in turn, gave such a sterling contribution to our economy, and which also provided a prosperous future to thousands of young emerging students and others who wanted to diversify their career, and in so doing ameliorate their standard of living and that of their families.

It is very typical of this administration to commit government’s finances according to its party political exigencies andnot those of the country. The whole saga of the new power station is an outstanding example.

Instead of investing in our country’s future, Muscat’s government short-sightedly prefers to ‘invest’ in its political future; instead of putting the money where our mouth is, this government chose to grant what Finance Minister Edward Scicluna himself defined as an unprecedented state-guarantee to the tune of €360 million to Electrogas to enable the winning consortium to seek financial backing for an unnecessary power station.

Not only that. This power station is envisaged to overburden the country’s expense on the energy sector as a result of Labour’s decision to prioritise Konrad Mizzi’s power station over a stable, reliable, cleaner and cheaper energy produced by the interconnector.

Busuttil’s proposals as outlined above meet the stringent test of serious organisations and economists. They are a safe passage out of an uncertain future brought about by a mentality so apparent and abundant in Muscat’s government: here and now as if tomorrow never comes. And if tomorrow will turn out to be a rainy day?

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