Labouring to deceive

Times of Malta
Saturday, 21st March 2009

Edward Demicoli

After five years of consistent hard work by Maltese diplomats in Brussels, the European Commission has agreed to allow Malta to permanently keep a derogation allowing our country not to charge VAT on food and medicines. This was no easy task.

During our negotiations for entry into the European Union, Malta had worked hard to try and get a derogation from this rule and, at the time, managed to obtain a temporary reprieve until 2010.

When compared to Cyprus's attempt to negotiate the same derogation, this was considered a victory, especially since Cyprus had to accept a shorter period of adjustment and today has introduced VAT on food and medicines. Malta did not.

This little island of 400,000 inhabitants, the smallest in the EU, said no. We continued arguing our case post-membership, we took a stand, we made our point, we showed Europe that we import all our food and medicine, that we have increased costs, that economies of scale work against us. We were relentless in pursuit of our right and we could do this because we believe that we can make a difference.

The Labour Party (PL) does not believe this. It is as simple as that. The PL never believed in Europe and never believed that we can make a success of Europe. Even though today they talk the talk on Europe, they cannot walk the walk because they do not know how.

It is ironic that, while the government was relentlessly pursuing Malta's interest, the PL leader was trying to make us believe that Malta was paying more to Europe, that we are contributing to Europe and not benefiting. In a nutshell, what Joseph Muscat is saying, with just a minimal effort of reading between the lines, is that Europe was a bad idea and that himself, Alfred Sant and Sharon Ellul Bonici were right. We should not have joined as we are contributing more. Dr Muscat is trying to say: "I told you so!"

The truth though is different. Labour is once more labouring to deceive on Europe as it did in the years prior to the referendum.

I remember those years well. It was my task to inform the public on Europe. On the issue of VAT on food and medicines, we had told the public that the government was negotiating on this issue. The PL was scaring everyone into believing that the prices of food and medicines are going to explode because of VAT, that the Sicilians will take our jobs, that we will not have an EU Commissioner, that we will lose our overtime, that the Maltese will never be an official EU language that... the list goes on.

The truth is simple. Dr Muscat was and still is wrong. He was wrong six years ago and he was wrong the other day. He was also wrong 18 months ago when he said that we should wait before joining the euro. His party was wrong when it said we should devalue the lira before joining the eurozone. Wrong, wrong and wrong again. Everyone can see that today because the facts have shown that the PL was, and please allow me to repeat myself once again, wrong.

The sad thing is that Dr Muscat does not accept these facts. Instead of admitting that his calculations on the funds Malta received were off the mark by some €200 million, he had Charles Mangion write an article trying to patch things up and not succeeding at all, one might add. Instead of telling everyone that, had we listened to his advice on Europe and on the euro, we would be so much worse off, all Dr Muscat has to say is that we are now members of the EU and there is nothing more to say. Matter closed, says he.

Well, I beg to differ. On all the important decisions this country had to make, the PL was wrong. It can admit it was wrong and start afresh, a real new beginning. It has to tell us so that next time an important decision is to be taken we can look at the PL's track record and compare it to that of the Nationalist Party.

And therein lies the difference between the two parties. Whenever our Prime Minister was convinced that an alternative course of action was more viable he changed course.
It is the mark of a true leader to recognise one's mistakes and to have the maturity to change tack. In persisting in the error of his and his predecessor's ways, Dr Muscat is showing us he has a long way to go to be considered in the same league.

Mr Demicoli is a Nationalist Party candidate for the European Parliament elections.