The blind man was the first to speak: the water and electricity bills are too high for people like me: we need to use appliances, as they are safer. Medicines are also too expensive and my income is not enough. Two other persons with similar problems made the same points. Last Wednesday, a group of parliamentarians met people who are experiencing poverty. They got a sympathetic ear. But that is not enough. They expect specific social and economic measures by government to address their problems.
Poverty does not fall out of the sky. It is the result of specific policies and government has to deliver a concrete action plan to enable the poor to move out of poverty. But fighting poverty is not a government priority. The families of persons with disability have been waiting for 18 months for the government to reverse a policy decision and exempt cars bought for disabled persons from certain taxes.
The prevailing attitude to deal with poverty is still the charity model. Poverty has been put on the agenda only because the European Union (EU) has declared this year as the year to fight poverty and social exclusion. Even the leaders of the EU are not losing much sleep over trying to find ways of eliminating poverty. In the last summit they did not even find time to discuss the plight of 80 million people living in poverty in one of the richest regions in the world. Hopefully they might find some time to mention poverty when they meet in June!
Last Wednesday’s meeting started with the point that, in a democracy, the rich and poor are equal because they all have one vote. Yes, we have moved on from the time when the rich had more than one vote and the poor had none. But the rich have many ways and means to influence ministers and politicians to shape policies and decisions to their benefit, while the poor are voiceless. The neo-liberal doctrine that prosperity and inequality march together has been allowed to prevail again for the last 30 years. No wonder that even in the EU, with its social model, inequality is on the rise. But there are facts to show that equality, prosperity and innovation can go together and that a more equal society is better for everybody.
A mother whose sight is severely impaired told us last Wednesday that in a few years’ time, once her children become teenagers and can look after themselves, she would be ready to go out to work, earn money and pay taxes. She does not want to be dependent on the state but at the moment all the burden of dealing with her disability is falling on her husband. She is not entitled to any support as he earns more than the minimum wage. She needs modern IT equipment and a guide dog to improve her quality of life. But how can she afford them?
A young man said that in a few months he will be leaving prison. What chance does he have to get a job? How is he going to make ends meet? How is he going to pay the rent and the bills? He is afraid that he will end up caught again in the vicious cycle of crime, drugs and alcoholism.
A mother is very worried that her intelligent daughter – who is doing well at school – wants to drop out at the end of secondary school to go out to work and bring some income to the family. The mother is separated after suffering years of abuse from her husband, who now does not contribute anything to this broken family. One of the children is disabled, and the mother works hard to earn some money but her wage hardly amounts to enough for a decent life.
A Sudanese recounted what 700 immigrants have to go through every day in the detention camp at Hal Far. There are 15 toilets and showers and 22 cookers for 700 persons. When it is cold they cannot shower as the water is freezing. They live in containers and tents. They cannot meet their basic needs and when they are out of detention they have to beg for a job at Marsa.
A man spoke of his family living in a crowded apartment. He is dreading the day he leaves the Caritas Rehabilitation Centre that has helped him so much to give him a sense of values, life skills and a new purpose in life but once he is ‘out there’, will he be given the opportunity to start a new life and work and move on, or he will he going back to sleep in the open in summer and wherever he finds in winter?
Another young person said that he needs €900 to start life when he leaves prison to be able to pay for rent, bills and other basic necessities. He was born into a poor family and had to steal for a living. He would like to move away from crime and get a job. Will he be given a chance?
A number of persons with mental health problems spoke of the stigma they still face and how this is the major obstacle to find a job that will give them the possibility not to depend on their parents or the state. A pensioner stressed that poverty is rising among those over 65, and have reached 22% (a 37% increase since 2004) as they simply cannot afford electricity bills and medicines. He pointed out that males are more at risk of poverty at this age. Younger poor are mainly women as half of single women live in poverty with their children. More than one in five of our children live in poverty and hardly anything is being done to give them the necessary resources to pull themselves out of poverty.
We need serious measures to help people break out of poverty. Rev. Dr Charles Tabone’s and Dr Angela Abela’s studies, along with Mario Cardona’s report about poverty in Malta launched last Wednesday show us that the poor’s silence helps poverty to remain invisible, with many teachers not even knowing that certain students live in poverty. While some think that the poor are lazy, most of the poor are people who want to break out of poverty if they ever have the chance.
Serious and effective measures need to be taken because poverty is a complex issue that needs to be tackled with vision, energy and determination. The government has a plan against poverty, but it is very weak and unfocused. The government should make an evaluation of its positive and negative aspects and draw up a better action plan to address poverty effectively. The preferential option for the poor, to lift the poor and disadvantaged out of their position, should be one of the leading values of the Labour Party as an alternative government.
One of every five children lives in poverty. Together with the children and the aged those more susceptible to poverty and social exclusion are the disabled, the single parents, gays and transgendered persons, unemployed and those who have a precarious non-unionised job and immigrants. While there are 15% who live in poverty, there are also 15% who are at risk of living in poverty.
Even those earning a minimum wage live in poverty. EU studies show that Malta is one of a number of countries where the minimum wage does not make up for the increase in the cost of living. Meanwhile, NSO analyses show that between 2003 and 2007, inequalities in wages have increased.
There has been an increase of 17% in the salaries of high officials. Professionals’ income has increased by 20%. Certain industrial workers in factories had a 20% wage increase, but restaurant and hotel workers’ wages have increased by only 2% and those who performed elementary work had increased by 3%. However, salespersons and people in the retail trade had seen their wages decrease by 1%.
Education is the tool for poor children to break out of poverty, but unless their families are helped and have better incomes, housing and health care, educational reforms will never be enough to help poor children succeed. At the age of two, poor children are already behind other children due to lack of nutrition and care. We are still not addressing children’s needs adequately within the educational system. Thousands of children are lost due to lack of vocational subjects. Around 2,000 children every year were lost within the educational system. Half of the 40% of our young people who drop out of school at the age of 15 do so because they live in poverty.
Our social and economic policies need to be designed better to attack the causes of poverty. Reducing poverty will make our society more prosperous, democratic and just.
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