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The Malta Council for Economic and Social Development (MCESD) has been very beneficial for the country. It has fostered a multilateral running dialogue between the social partners that has stood us all good. It could even have done better if allowed to. Not surprisingly, the limiting factor has been the government, always jealous of its grip on the economy whilst steering it in the direction it believes to be the best for the country’s wellbeing and sturdy economic growth.
There were times, not so long ago, when the constituted bodies could not even discuss issues of national import with ministers. They were political pariahs. In a way they themselves were to blame for such a pitiful state of affairs: they simply could not be trusted in their sense of confidentiality or covert political agenda as perceived by the government of the day.
That was 20 years ago. At that time I had been absent from any public sector involvement for 12 years, save for a part-time lecturing post at the University which I managed to hold through thick and thin since 1962. Even though my basic beliefs were, and still are, deeply seeped in social justice and solidarity, possibly the only traits of christianity left in me, I was generally opposed to the way the Labour administration had been handling the economic, not the social, problems of the time. One cannot properly tackle the latter at the expense of the former. Reality, not idealism.
So, when I was invited to take an active role inside the Federation of Industry (FOI), I accepted. Fortuitously, my election as president coincided to the day with a change in premiership. With KMB one knew where one stood. In the presence of a number of my council members and half his cabinet, I proffered the FOI’s hand of cooperation in the interest of the economy. It was accepted forthwith. And it lasted.
Other constituted bodies soon followed suit. The Confederation of Private Enterprise (COPE), their umbrella organisation, lightened up and relaxed. Except for a tiny insidious partisan element which feared that too much cooperation might possibly tip the balance in favour of re-electing the Labour Party for a fourth consecutive term - almost an impossibility in a democratic two–party system.
In a year when four cabinet ministers regularly met with representatives from business and industry, and actually overrode bureaucracy and activated what was agreed upon, I found it impossible to leave out a reference of appreciation to the Minister of Industry in my speech to the FOI’s annual general meeting. This angered the hard-core anti-Labour faction so much that they personally canvassed against my re-election and succeeded. But only just, thanks to the exporters, mainly foreign, who were unimpressed with this behaviour and told me so.
Relieved of my FOI position, I was immediately appointed deputy chairman of the Malta Development Corporation (MDC). For a while as they lasted, I continued attending the discussions between government and employers, this time including also the GWU, whose leader never failed to contribute to the national, as distinct from the sectoral, wellbeing in whatever shape or form he was invited to.
This attitude impressed me tremendously, such that when later I was asked to become the GWU’s economic adviser, I was happy to accept. I felt absolutely no conflict whatsoever with my position as managing director of a sizeable manufacturing unit or with my continued membership of the FOI.
It was the academic side of me which suffered. I had been a full-time senior lecturer until I joined the MDC in 1968 when I agreed to stay on as a part-time lecturer on an appointment basis. I openly disagreed with some of premier Mintoff’s economic policies even during my very short stint with the Central Bank after I left the MDC. I decided I had enough of the public sector. I was offered the chair of accountancy at the University, but I declined in favour of managing an export manufacturing company.
Not a whiff of revenge from the ‘terror’ administration. I even continued in my part-time appointment at the University. Until, ironically, there was a change in government in 1987 when, for no reason except that I had ignored the public call to resign as an electoral commissioner, my University appointment was abruptly terminated. Not even a letter of thanks after 25 years in academia. Such is the stuff the autonomous University authorities are made of: the very antithesis of what the public expects from them, an intellectual counterbalance to political myopia.
When Labour regained power nine years later I was again invited to give some lectures, presumably by way of contrition. Sporadically, I still lecture now, but without any appointment or status and at hourly rates inferior to my gardener’s.
All this is typical of the pettiness extant in this ‘jewel’ of an island-state in the European Union - a despicable state of affairs which suppresses most of our academics from voicing their knowledge and impartial views.
What is worse, it engenders an intellectual dishonesty in those who do raise their voices, mainly in anticipation of an extra-curriculum appointment in some quango or authority, even where their academic background hardly fits the post at all. We have seen it in chairmen of MDC, MFSA, Maltacom, PBS and others.
What has all this to do with MCESD? Once the public cannot turn to academics for a balanced overall view on what is so hotly debated there, where each representative speaks exclusively in defence of his sector, would it not be a good idea to appoint, as spectators, three (or more) knowledgeable independent and apolitical persons to represent the general public? Hopefully, also acting as the other members’ ‘conscience’? They must be ‘acceptable people,’ as the Leader of the Opposition described them in the context of Air Malta’s restructuring exercise.
Yes, they must be acceptable to all political parties, but with connections to none. After a topic has been fully treated, let the Maltese public hear the views of these three wise guys, even if not unanimous. Especially in the forthcoming make-or-break months providing gestation to a social pact.
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