The Nationalist Party has carried out a negative campaign claiming that Malta has become a hotbed of corruption. We have been told that foreigners believe that Malta is no longer a place to do business and that going forward, we face economic doom.

It was very strange therefore that, when the European Commission published its Spring Economic Forecasts on May 11, we found that according to its experts our economy will have the highest growth among all EU countries in both 2017 and 2018. They also projected that the state of our public finances will be the best in the EU. Moreover they pointed out that these projections assumed no change in economic direction and policies.

Therefore the claims made by the PN about our economy slowing down are completely off the mark. If anything, from being the country with the second highest rate of growth in 2016, now we will be in the first place.

What about the PN claim that Malta is now associated with corruption? For instance, we are told that the Malta Files show that we are a corrupt country.

Frankly the Malta Files’ claim is that we have a competitive tax system, and that this is resulting in our financial sector’s growth at the expense of that in other countries.

Isn’t it blatantly obvious that in reality we are in a much better position than the PN claims?

As a result of this very rapid expansion, the European Commission has argued that Malta has to be careful to ensure that enough resources are devoted to regulation. Once again, there have been some attempts to spin this into a negative judgement.

However, there has been little talk of the fact that the commission’s Country Specific Recommendations for Malta, issued on May 22, do not mention corruption. In contrast, in no less than 14 countries, the Commission felt the need to include explicit warnings on corruption.

The Commission warned Bulgaria that “corruption… continues to weigh on investment”, and that its judicial system is not independent. Similar comments were made on Croatia. To the Latvian government, the commission said that “corruption continues to hamper Latvia’s business environment and the system for preventing conflicts of interest remains rigid and formalistic, with insufficient verification”.

To Lithuania the commission complained that “the number of bribery cases brought to courts has been on a steady rise in recent years”, while “weak whistle-blower arrangements discourage tip-offs about potential irregularities”.

The commission warned Hungary that “corruption risks remain high, adversely impacting the business climate, and there are notable gaps in the measures taken to address the issue”. Similarly for Romania the commission complained of “widespread corruption” that had eroded trust.

As for Slovenia, the commission noted that “perception of corruption remains negative and appears to influence business decisions”, while for Slovakia the recommendations conclude that “corruption remains a challenge”. Meanwhile “the Czech Republic faces challenges in preventing corruption as well as inefficiencies in public procurement”. Finally for Poland the commission argues that “the current systemic threat to the rule of law creates legal uncertainty”.

The commission warned the Spanish government that “despite a surge in corruption investigations involving cases at the local and regional levels, no tailor-made preventive strategies to mitigate corruption risks have been developed”. The Italian State was warned that “several indicators confirm that corruption is still a major problem in Italy” and that cases are often prescribed.

As for Cyprus, the commission remarked on the “weaknesses in the disciplinary regime for public servants” and that the way the courts functioned “undermines the business environment”.

Finally Portugal was warned that anti-corruption measures were weak and “it remains to be seen whether these will be reflected by improvements in final conviction rates for high-level corruption”.

In the face of such a strong stance towards half of the member states, why would the commission not mention corruption in Malta’s report if it were indeed an issue? Isn’t it blatantly obvious that in reality we are in a much better position than the PN claims?

Moody’s Investor Services seems to be of that very opinion. When they issued their annual Issuer In-Depth report on May 23, they stated that Malta has a “robust policy framework” and that “Malta’s institutional improvement is also reflected by the relative high ranking in the Worldwide Governance Indicators of the World Bank”.

Moody’s experts note that “Malta’s scores on rule of law and control of corruption are in the 81st and 74th percentile respectively among all sovereigns rated by Moody’s” and that “Malta outperforms its rating peers” in this aspects. Consequently Moody’s rates Malta’ institutional strength as high (+).

It is not a coincidence that, this month, two important international institutions chose to give such a vote of confidence to Malta. This, among a myriad other reasons, should be why on June 3 voters should give their own vote of confidence to Muscat and his programme for our country.

Deborah Schembri is Parliamentary Secretary for Planning and Simplification of Administrative Processes.