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The good, the bad and the very ugly Harry Vassallo takes a look at the past, analyses our fatal mistakes and makes the case for change in the way the PN and MLP are doing politics…
Since independence Malta has managed an astounding miracle. Those of us who were children then have memories of a Malta that has gone forever.
We may sometimes be drawn to be nostalgic about the fading of the more folkloristic aspects but none of us has anything but relief at the disappearance of a significant part of our population that was poor, uneducated, living in unhygienic conditions.
Industrial development and the development of the tourism industry took hold against the odds. Emigration ended, the population continued to grow and so did the economy. There had been very little on which to base the gamble of independence. We can pat ourselves on the back for transforming this little rock of ours from a fortress into a home.
Labour rule built on what it found and carried out a social revolution which gave us perhaps the best wealth distribution situation anywhere. Given the depth and the width of the transformation, it was relatively bloodless. It was far from painless.
The return to power of the Nationalists in 1987 was a necessary change, a healthy alternation of government which released energies long suppressed under Labour rule. It ushered in the consumer age in Malta.
Because of the extreme bi-polar politics we tend to interpret everything in a political key: the PN did this, the MLP did that. And they did. They were not alone.
Throughout this time the Maltese have been hard at it hewing and hammering, weaving and sewing, wheeling and dealing. It is not all to the credit of politicians. My guess is that if history were to be written by people rather than by politicians and political parties, what credit goes to political leaders would be small compared to what the people have achieved for themselves. We have succeeded largely in spite of our politicians, not thanks to them.
In recent months this has become painfully obvious. The long delayed reform of the drydocks has cost the country Lm300 million and is expected to amount to Lm450 million when all is said and done. Arrears in tax which have turned out to be a form of pre-electoral creative accounting have wiped the smirk of our faces and Lm500 million off public accounts.
The new hospital will cost as much as an aircraft carrier to pay and to run. The Lm50 per year estimated running cost is just that: an estimate. If it is as far off the mark as the rest of infrastructural estimates have been we could be looking at triple that figure. We are told that government can no longer sustain the cost of the health system and that pension reform is massively urgent.
Economists tell us that we are overconsuming or that our productivity has not kept pace with our burgeoning consumption. At our present economic growth rate all EU countries will leave us far behind in the race. Their GDP curves upwards while ours runs flat below them. Something is seriously wrong.
Most of us do not feel that we have been extravagant. Far too many of us hold down more than one job. Our quality of life, judged by our earnings, is a misrepresentation of the facts. Most of us work like beasts and cannot make ends meet. The poverty line and the minimum wage met in 1994.
Since then our national debt curved upwards crossing the thousand million mark and within three years, half as much again. Interest payments now take up almost 10 percent of government expenditure.
If politics should not take the merit for our success, it can take much of the blame for our difficulties. Zero-sum politics has hampered our growth for decades: just imagine if it had been politically possible to restructure the drydocks decades ago. Imagine if we had Lm300 million to invest in education and research. Imagine if we had invested them instead of subsidising foreign shipowners with them.
Try to think where we would be if instead of killing one another we had taken the time to recognise the environmental damage that was been perpetrated all around us. The EU estimated that failure to implement the environmental aquis in the next 20 years will cost us between Lm10 million and Lm50 million per year. The cost items range from productivity lost through ill health, poor education of children hampered by environment generated illness, loss of earnings through the destruction of natural and heritage assets.
Extrapolated backwards for 30 years at the higher estimate as a saving instead of the cost it has been, we would not have a national debt. All the bleating of innocence from other party politicians that they did not know, just does not sell. They did not want to know. They laughed and laughed. They were too busy struggling to see who would rule the roost.
Now we are paying the cost. We will be paying for the rest of our lives. None of us will achieve the maximum we could have achieved because we have enjoyed the luxury of zero-sum politics for thirty years.
Globalisation has nothing to do with this. EU accession has nothing to do with it either. This country has been robbed of hundreds of millions of liri through the extravagance of personal ambition and partisan blindness. We could deal easily with the challenges of change if we could engage all our resources in one direction.
The one good thing about hitting bottom is that as our feet touch down we have something to push on. One rarely mentioned asset of our economy is that it has always worked against the weight of a political extravagance. If it is released, its muscle will come as a surprise to many. We certainly can bounce back and fast.
The question is whether we can get free of zero-sum politics which have compounded our difficulties with years of economic uncertainty, secret government and undiscovered corruption, a lack of transparency and accountability and eternal crises, carnivals and media manipulation. Which economy can stand the trauma of changing its tax system three times in three years for political reasons?
Asked whether the Greens would back the UHM’s proposal for a Social Pact to address the economic challenges, Greens have been quick to say ‘yes’ in principle. The devil may be in the details but we will deal with that too.
We have no faith that the other parties will be able to step out of their roles and reach agreement. It seems institutionally impossible. The two-party system programmes them for mutual destruction not for cooperation. Does anybody seriously expect the MLP to pull the PN out of the mess they are in? Would it happen if the roles were reversed?
Dr Vassallo is Chairperson of Alternattiva Demokratika – The Green Party
www.alternattiva.org.mt
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