Whether you agree with the concept of the Individual Investor Programme or not, it was a shocking Strasbourg plenary seeing fellow Maltese MEPs lobby so forcefully against their own country.

While, granted, it is true that an MEP is elected on his/her party ticket and speaks in the name of those who elected him/her, the whole ethos of the European Parliament is that representatives are there not to only represent their own narrow partisan interest within the framework of the wider groupings of the various political ideologies (EPP, S&D, Greens etc) but, more importantly, to be the voice and protect the national interests of their country within the context of wide-ranging European policies and proposals.

No matter how much they disagree with the IIP, it is beyond the pale that the MEPs from the Opposition decided to use their seats in the European Parliament to instigate a furore and throw Malta to the wolves, so to speak.

Using the same criteria, if the Labour Party had wanted to do something similar to inflict the most possible damage on the Nationalist government at the time, it had a perfect opportunity to do so during the divorce controversy. Did the Labour MEPs take the issue to the EU institution and make Malta undergo the humiliation of being lambasted for the government’s refusal to introduce this civil right?

It would have been easy to sit there in grim satisfaction as one MEP after another tore into the PN’s feeble and sometimes laughable arguments about why Malta was “not ready” for divorce, at the time the only EU member state to deny its citizens this civil right.

Similarly, the PL could have used the full brunt of the EU institution to point out that, by denying the right to divorce to other EU citizens resident in Malta, the Nationalist government was breaching their rights and going against the much-vaunted ideal of what it means to be European.

Shaming Malta at EU level is counter-productive and certainly not the role of an MEP

I am also sure that Viviane Reding would have had something to say about the rights of EU citizens in the divorce debate, although I suspect that, now, she is involving herself with much more gusto considering that her political group is (was) the EPP, the home of the zealous Nationalist MEPs!

Yet, the PL did none of these things because it was fully aware that a sensitive subject, such as divorce, is a national issue over which we have complete sovereignty. It was (and is) also fully cognisant that shaming Malta at EU level is counter-productive and certainly not the role of an MEP.

Malta is a full, equal member State of the EU. Despite its tiny size, Malta has just as much of a ‘say’ as any other larger state. However, the manner in which the Nationalist MEPs fought so hard to have Malta mentioned, criticised and even condemned specifically in the resolution passed about citizenship schemes makes one wonder whether they are treating the EP as a form of Big Brother to which they will go running at every opportunity, demanding that the other member states castigate our country.

Is this sovereignty? No, this is a throwback to a colonial mindset where, rather than debating and solving national issues by ourselves, the Opposition feels the need to rope in the backing of other nations to score political points.

There has been a concerted attempt by the PN to portray the Labour government as being against free speech or of wanting to muzzle or ‘intimidate’ the Nationalist MEPs because they were criticising the citizenship scheme at a European level. This could not be further from the truth.

Criticism and debate are par for the course in politics. What was out of place was the way the PN completely redefined the role of their MEPs within the European Parliament to undermine and demolish the very thing they were purportedly trying to defend: Malta’s name and reputation.

What, exactly, did they achieve by having Malta’s citizenship scheme singled out in the resolution? Rather than using the debate to discuss and formulate European policy on how different EU member states should be allowed to sell their citizenship, the two Nationalist MEPs were determined to take things to the furthest extreme, lobbying relentlessly and insisting that Malta be made a scapegoat, for something which is already being done by other member states.

They claimed that their crusade was not against Malta but against a scheme. Yet, when given the opportunity to prove how genuine this statement was they voted so that Malta’s name remains. Removal of the reference to Malta would not have changed the substance of the resolution. Yet, they could not even bring themselves to do even that for their country.

Party above all, indeed!

For, make no mistake about it, no matter in which terms the schemes of the other member states are couched, what they are doing – among them Austria, Cyprus, Portugal, others and, now, the UK – in real terms and in essence is the same thing as what Malta is proposing. What differs is the semantics, the technicalities and, in many cases, the higher price.

The other countries have designed a scheme to suit their need and convenience, the end result of which is... citizenship in exchange for money.

All attempts have been made by the government to accede to the PN’s demands to amend the IIP (removal of anonymity clause, tying citizenship to investment and capping the number of applicants) but the PN keeps moving the goalposts.

It is clear that it has never wanted consensus. Its only goal has been to demolish the image of the Labour government abroad. The fact that it is Malta’s image that lies in tatters is just another casualty of the Nationalist MEPs’ misguided and short-sighted war.

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Marlene Mizzi is a Labour MEP.