The PN government is promising us a new national transport system by 2015 that will comprise buses and vans of different sizes, a tram system and water taxis. We are told that the new transport system will be clean, efficient and socially and financially sustainable and will encourage people to leave their private cars at home and embrace public means of transport. It all sounds good. We do need a good, clean public transport system that will make our country a better place to live in. We have too many private cars clogging our roads, polluting our air, swarming all over our meagre open spaces and damaging our mental and physical health.
But will the PN government deliver on its promises to give us a clean and new public transport system in the coming years? Nearly 20 years ago, the PN daily In-Nazzjon (8th March 1989) on its frontpage in bold headlines proclaimed the PN government’s determination to carry out a radical reform of the public transport system for the benefit of everybody. The same promise was repeated in the same newspaper on 16th November 1989. Years passed and nothing really happened.
Public transport went off the government agenda and resurfaced in September of four years ago when Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi promised that steps were to be taken soon to improve the public transport system and give the people value for money. Dr Gonzi promised first that the necessary reforms would be carried out and only then will the people be expected to pay higher fares.
A year ago, on 8th August 2007, the PN daily claimed in its headlines that the PN government had achieved huge successes in the public transport system. A few days ago government announced the need for major reforms of the public transport system admitting that very little had been done over the years and that all the different efforts aimed at improving the public transport system had actually achieved very little. In the coming years we will see whether this PN government will deliver what it has failed to deliver over the last 20 years.
Minister Gatt is claiming that he has improved transport for the dead, now he has to do the same for the living. He has already told us that for a better transport service we have to be ready to pay more. But at least this Minister is to be congratulated for making it possible for us to get free coffins. We are the only country in the world where coffins have become completely free.
Free coffins on offer
Around 200 years ago saloons in the United States started offering “free” lunches to those who at least bought one drink. These free lunches cost more than the price of a single drink but the saloon-owner expected “free lunches’ to attract clients who would buy more than one drink. The saying "There ain't no such thing as a free lunch," refers to this custom, meaning that things which appear to be free are always paid for in some way. This is a phrase that we now meet quite often in economic text books to show among other things that any benefits provided by government are ultimately financed by citizens, mostly through their taxes.
If there is a minister who regularly lectures the citizens that there is no such thing as a free lunch, it is Minister Austin Gatt. So it was quite amazing to see him and hear him announce on television that one of the benefits of the liberalization of the permits for hearses is that from now on coffins are free.
People took him seriously and they have been expecting free coffins for their dear ones. Is Minister Gatt going to organize a special day when we can queue up in Valletta to pick up our free coffins?
Who is going to pay for these free coffins? I am told that modest coffins cost between €800 and €1000. A hearse service costs between €121 and €250. So how can a company that provides a hearse service afford to give free coffins, unless they are discarded matchboxes?
Since Minister Gatt declared that coffins are to be provided free of charge, people who lost their dear ones have been asking for free coffins. But no such coffins are available so far and while the cost of living continues to rise the cost of dying refuses to go down.