It is not a happy time for Labour supporters. These last 16 years in opposition have given their fair share of lows. Whenever there was a political "disaster", the same answer was given, that whatever might have happened, the leader must never be blamed - because he is always right.

One cannot detract from the merits of the MLP's leadership, in that it did not have any qualms in isolating the violent elements it had inherited from the past, but from then onwards, the road downhill was not a pleasant sight.

To cut a really long story short, pulling it off in 1996 with the Ċittadinmobil did not make Il-Kowċ tal-Bidla a winner by default. Possibly, it's because one does not always win by choosing catch-words and oft-quoted phrases, guarded by a host of fabrications, as a serious electoral plan. The only constant in Labour's administration was the amount of sailors deserting the sinking ship; and even when these subsided, the ballast of errors past and present kept pulling down. The irony is that, as the leader was made to be always right, the last campaign was more a model answer in scuttling a wreck than in sailing to a safe harbour. To be fair, the tunes of the apologists defending the leadership had been going on like a broken record from even before the results came out. And the reason is only one: Because for some people the leader is, indeed, always right. The victory celebrations on Sunday morning are damning evidence of that.

No, it most definitely is not a happy time for Labour supporters. One can only hope, for the sake of the Maltese people, that these supporters will have the courage to make a break in their party - a real break with the past, and not another cosmetic one. While reflecting on the 20,000-vote victory that shrivelled into an embarrassing marginal defeat, Cromwell's admittedly uncompromising words ought to be kept close at hand: "You have sat there too long for any good you have been doing. Depart... and let us have done with you."