Seventy years ago this month of October, Malta was in the grip of a general election, one that would see the Labour Party winning power for the first time in its history. It was also a landmark election because women voted for the first time. Labour won with a landslide 59.9 per cent and Paul Boffa became Malta’s first Labour prime minister.

The government he led has many achievements to its name. Great progress was achieved in the educational and medical fields. The Manderaggio slums in Valletta were demolished and decent habitable buildings replaced them.

Income tax and old age pensions were introduced. However, what is most memorable about Boffa as prime minister is the standards of good governance that he set, standards that have never been surpassed to the present day.

First of all, Boffa always practised politics as a public service. He meant this literally as he always remained close to the people he served. On a couple of occasions he even used his official car to give lifts to ordinary citizens who found themselves in emergency situations.

Throughout his career, Boffa always campaigned for the advancement of women. Labour had always been at the forefront of women’s rights as exemplified by the efforts of one of the first female Labour activists, the almost totally forgotten Liza Fenech, who in the inter-war years promoted women’s right to vote at a time when such an idea was derided by many people.

It was, in fact, Boffa who moved the motion at the National Assembly in 1945 which granted women the right to vote and he was also the person who encouraged a young Agatha Barbara when she contested the general election in 1947 and thus become the first female member of Parliament.

Malta’s first Labour prime minister also had a horror of all kinds of clientelism and political nepotism or favouritism. He would not even favour members of his own family when they needed some service from the government. Furthermore, Boffa remained a gentleman to the end of his life, even when he was treated really shabbily by Dom Mintoff who, as his deputy, was totally disloyal to him in 1949 and eventually replaced him as Labour leader.

I am sure he would be horrified at the low ethical standards of present-day Maltese politics

The story of how Boffa fell from power is also legendary. After the 1949 dispute with Mintoff and the subsequent ‘split’ within the Labour ranks, a minor political party on whose support Boffa’s government relied for its political survival requested that a public service job be allocated to a particular person.

Boffa did not entertain this request and, in 1950, the party retaliated by voting against his government on a money vote, thus bringing down the Boffa government.

One must also not forget the 1951 and 1953 coalitions between the Malta Workers’ Party led by Boffa and the Nationalist Party led by Giorgio Borg Olivier. Whenever it was in the national interest, Boffa was ready to serve even in a government led by one of his political adversaries.

In fact, he was twice a minister in a cabinet led by Borg Olivier. Could you seriously imagine something like that happening today? One would be subjected to contempt and ridicule if one even dared to suggest anything of the sort.

Boffa continued behaving with the utmost dignity even in the most difficult period of his life when at the 1955 election he was not even allowed to contest on the Labour ticket. Mintoff probably always knew he had been unfair to Boffa and in 1976 he erected a monument in his memory.

Today, when many are commenting about the low standards Maltese politics have reached, it would be worthwhile to remember the shining example of Boffa. He was a politician who always tried to work hand in hand with his political adversaries in the national interest.

He also never found it hard to praise his adversaries when they carried out good work. Indeed, in 1929 he even praised the Nationalist Opposition for its contribution to the Workmen’s Compensation Act passed by the “Compact Government” led by Gerald Strickland and supported by the Labour Party.

Seventy years from the great Labour victory of 1947, we should ask ourselves what would Boffa say if he were to be asked on the state of Maltese politics today. I am sure he would be delighted with the social and economic progress achieved. On the other hand, I am also sure he would be horrified at the low ethical standards of present-day Maltese politics. He would probably ask: “How did we come to this?”

Desmond Zammit Marmarà is a Balzan Labour councillor.