Amidst the bounty promised from both parties in new beginnings and all possibilities in unity, I am sorry to be the party pooper, but we really should pay some attention to the fact that the European Commission has assessed that there are risks to Malta achieving its target of a balanced budget in 2010.
This due to the reliance on volatile tax revenue items in 2008; the recent decision to subsidise energy prices without compensating measures; the macroeconomic outlook after 2008 and the lack of information about the underlying measures, especially as regards the envisaged continued restraint in the public wage bill.
The stability programme envisages continued progress towards the Medium Term Objective (MTO) of a balanced budget, which Malta plans to achieve in 2010 through a combination of expenditure restraint and sustained economic growth, but with reservations at the risks mentioned above.
All the largesse being bandied about right now does not tally with expenditure restraint. Unless we strike oil, there is no way that most of the election fever promises are going to be honoured.
“The European Union is a challenge and our job as a Labour government will be focused on how to strengthen and improve our relations with the EU,” Sant said in response to PN claims that Labour will sever relations with the EU.
And the challenges are certainly there. The EC assessment mentioned above “invites” Malta to “(i) pursue further fiscal consolidation as envisaged in the programme so as to reach the MTO by 2010 and ensure that the debt-to-GDP ratio is reduced accordingly, by spelling out the measures supporting the planned consolidation, especially on the expenditure side; and (ii) enhance the efficiency and flexibility of public spending, including accelerating the design and implementation of a comprehensive healthcare reform.”
Now health is one of the big bones the parties are grappling with, with Labour saying it will keep health services free of charge and claiming the PN were actively considering introducing charges to health services.
“I can guarantee that a Labour government will keep health services free of charge and offer better services,” said Dr Sant. Dr Gonzi on the other hand is claiming that the Health Service will not suffer under the PN.
But how are either of them going to implement the needed “efficiency and flexibility of public spending, including accelerating the design and implementation of a comprehensive healthcare reform”.
Now every decent human being wants health care to be available to all who need it, but for that to be possible the cash has got to come from somewhere.
Besides telling us how amazing our health service is going to be after the March election, the parties should also be telling us how they are going to implement the comprehensive health reform necessary to control expenditure.
We also need to know where the money is going to come from to compensate for the energy subsidies.

Now for a bit of fun
Daphne does veer in and out of the closet in her role as a PN Groupie. She was definitely out when Richard Cachia Caruana was ensconced in the Office of the Prime Minister with, now President and then PM, Eddie Fenech Adami.
She had then made a public apology for having previously called EFA “a country lawyer”. It had been a put down remark, which was tantamount to calling him a bumpkin.
Later she aimed her guns at a prominent Nationalist, then Foreign Minister later President, Guido de Marco. That cost her the column at The Sunday Times, because the then editor Laurence Grech refused to publish her comments on de Marco and she got them aired at The Independent.
The ones at the OPM behind the attacks on de Marco were successful in getting him kicked upstairs to the Presidency. Daphne was useful. So much so that at the EU accession celebrations, she even formed part of the EFA entourage ascending the steps at Castille.
But when EFA made way for a new PN leader, she decided to go back to the closet and was very antagonistic to Laurence Gonzi when he became Prime Minister, making fun of him because of the way she claimed he treated his wife at the ceremony swearing him in as PM.
Maybe, she was worried RCC was about to lose his power at the OPM under the new PM.
In the meantime, she has delivered a few knocks at the establishment. Let’s face it; there would not be a lot to fill column spaces with otherwise.
But now that the Labour Babaw is rearing its nasty head, Daphne is out again with a new makeover and has regained her place as cheerleader in true blue. Laurence Gonzi is now her hero: “Lawrence Gonzi, who had come on stage hugging his appealingly nice wife (no wonder married women like him so much)”, she wrote on Thursday.
Come on Daphne are you not embarrassed at being such an overt sycophant. Her descriptions of the crowd at a PN mass gathering are truly pass the bucket stuff.
He (Gonzi) “stood before a backdrop of happy, rosy, glowing youth wearing white T-shirts. On television…he was framed by their sunny faces… In between singing, shouting, dancing and cheerfully booing in pantomime fashion all references to the Labour Party and its attempts to keep Malta out of the European Union, the message the crowd was hearing was a positive one”.
Now here is how Daphne described the Labour Party gathering: “Though the sun was out, it was black on that stage. Alfred Sant wore dark clothes and ranged behind him, instead of the shiny faces of people whose lives are just beginning, were the glowering visages of men whose lives are drawing to a close, but who are telling us that they can do a better job of leading the country… The dispiriting negativity that emanated from the stage clearly affected the crowd…
“They all wore black coats or other light-sucking apparel… the effect was of a huddle at a funeral as the coffin was going down.” All she needed to do was bring in Dracula. But having set the scene she was allowing our imagination to do the rest.
“One of my sons came into the room just as the camera homed in on The Leader making a serious point with a grim facial expression, his men pressed together behind him in their black coats with their menacing expressions, and the words shot out of his mouth: ‘They look like something from the Kremlin’.”
Now I could not care less whether you, the reader, votes Labour or Nationalist, because frankly I think that both parties have let us down in one way or another, so don’t for a minute think that I am taking sides. Neither am I trying to tell you to vote for AD. Although, the only party I would certainly not recommend is AN.
But I cannot bear double standards. Daphne has an enormous chip on her shoulder, despite all her talk of positive thinking and moving on; her anger at the MLP is still very palpable.
For heavens sake, what did the PN line up look like in their own dark suits and sombre countenances if not another funeral party?
I too think that Gonzi comes across as confidant, but he is hardly Superman and all Daphne’s whiteness and sunshine straight out of a Persil advertisement frankly stinks.
The PN has a lot to answer for when it comes to whiter than white. To his credit, and that is where Gonzi is good, he does recognise where he needs to back pedal furiously. His pledge to take over MEPA is his way of combating the Cacopardo defection and ensuing allegations of his (Gonzi’s) collusion in corruption scandals.
Whether that is going to be enough to convince the electorate that the PN will change in response to Labour’s zero tolerance stance on corruption is questionable.

pamelapacehansen@gmail.com