A very wise local politician (former finance minister Lino Spiteri) wrote shortly before the 2013 national election in the Times of Malta, under the heading ‘Change in a foggy air’, of his hopes that middle-class new Labour would retain a broad social cutting edge such that the political differential between Malta’s alternative potential governments would be much more than simple efficiency in managing the country.
After four years of new Labour, perhaps a floating voter will say that while some important things have indeed changed, some abominable old Maltese habits have not changed.
Foremost in my own thoughts is the certainty that this administration’s ‘business-friendly approach’ was taken “too close to their own personal heart” by a multiplicity of individuals who power-wield at lower strata than was the habit under the previous governments. I know many on the left of the local political divide that equally abhor the selfish misinterpretation of the generic ‘righteousness’ of being business-friendly as practised by those of the ‘new’, irrespective of whether they serve at the top, middle or lower echelons of ‘power’.
More ideologically, to bring about a new middle class should have meant that the wage of thousands of minimum wage earners would have to increase faster than other incomes… yet their relative position has thus far remained frozen, as throughout the previous third of a century.
On the other hand, some important things have very evidently changed for the better. An impressive majority does welcome the reduced utility tariffs; and that is irrespective of whether these result from better use of new technology or mere market-pricing good luck.
One hopes, nevertheless, that the public purse gets no nasty surprise call on the financial guarantees that the ‘new’ provided for the long-overdue capital investment (even though, in my personal opinion, it was unnecessary and wrong to act covertly… precisely because of the involvement of friendly businesses).
After four years of new Labour, perhaps a floating voter will say that while some important things have indeed changed, some abominable old Maltese habits have not changed
Meaningful inward investment – it has long been a personal view that if Malta never made it to the football World Cup finals it would not matter, but that if Malta attracted to the management of its country a first-class team of locals who understand and are able to practise marketing principles effectively in diverse parts of the globe, our small economy would show surprisingly high growth rates within very short lead times.
Economic growth such as has been achieved recently cannot but be the envy of every previous Maltese government since 1981.
The velocity of job creation is also undoubtedly ‘new’ and much more than just welcome.
But new Labour will not retain mass appeal if it progresses down the road of measuring its success by the height of new high-rise buildings it permits its supporter developers to erect ‘on the back’ of low wages paid to African immigrants, who are enslaved by what some consider legalities and others consider as mere formalities which exclude non-Europeans even from minimum-wage subsistence level.
New Labour must toil to be judged by the size of its effective solidarity with a much wider spectrum of the weakest of both Malta’s present and its future society, as it has now done by delivering increased resources to the disabled.
If The Sunday Times of Malta reader has persisted thus far with this opinion piece, he/she is probably curious to know the degree of recent obfuscation of Malta’s air compared with four years ago, as measured by the author, who in recent months suffered more than a due fair share of public mention.
Using the faculty of straight talk available to one who is recently but irrevocably retired from public activity, I openly confess to delusion at the delay in early post-2012 purification of the air that ‘Malta lkoll’ was promised by way of transparency; delays in completion of projects involving technological infrastructure are understandable, delays in expected change of ideology may be less forgivable to those floaters who are altruistic and who count more than only that which reaches their own pockets.
God forbid that the present ‘acutely number-aware’ New Labour continues to act as though it believes that nepotism (if not also, vile corruption) causes only partial opaqueness but not a state of mental uncertainty which a relevant number of us had hoped would be behind us by now.
Philip Rizzo is a recently retired public official whose previous personal training and experience included audits, investigations and cost-reduction analysis.