In 1981, the people clearly wanted a change of Administration. By means that were perfectly legitimate in legal and constitutional terms but much less so in democratic terms, the Labour Party managed to hang on to power. However, it proved to be a Pyrrhic victory – a disastrous legislature and a massive loss of the people’s trust from which it has barely recovered yet.

Incredibly, we are seeing an almost carbon-copy repetition. In the last election, people wanted a change. By highly dubious means, the Nationalist Party managed to hang on to a razor-thin relative majority of some 1,500 votes and retain power – of a sort. But this legislature is turning out to be even more disastrous for the PN than the 1981-1987 legislature was for Labour, with the Prime Minister spending most of his time and energy fire-fighting serious allegations of maladministration and trying to keep a highly unruly parliamentary group in check. Polls indicate its popularity is plunging as fast as PL’s ever did, post-1981.

People never seem to learn from the mistakes made by others – they have to make their own.