16 - 22 November 2000

Monday Blues

Next Monday, Finance Minister John Dalli will present his government’s budget for 2001. There is no doubt that the government is facing a daunting task ahead. On the one hand, it realises that unless it increases its revenues, the deficit will simply continue to grow. Come January, the government is going to have to fork out more than Lm28 million liri to cover the capital outlay to finance the collective agreement signed with the Civil Service in 1998. The hike in oil prices and subsequent increases for Enemalta will somehow have to be made good for. A few weeks ago following a meeting of the Malta Council for Economic Development, Mr Dalli stated that the next budget will be such that it will reduce expenditure while at the same time ensure that tax collection is enforced and the millions in outstanding taxes will be paid.
Secondly, the government is more than aware that increasing taxation will result in even more protests from the General Workers’ Union and the other Social Partners. Within days of the last budget, the GWU made it very clear that it would not accept any more burdens on the middle class worker. Twelve months on, the union is still calling on the government to make amends. It would therefore be very unwise and a political mistake to increase taxes on the people when the wounds of last year’s budget are still wide open. While the government may say that such increases are inevitable if the country’s economic problems are to be tackled once and for all, it is also risking alienating those voters – a substantial number in fact – who in 1998 felt that the then Labour government had gone too far. In three years’ time, the figures may show otherwise but the people do not easily forget – and our MPs know all too well that come election time, promises and electoral manifestos mean nothing. What people do remember are the added burdens incurred.
Then again, the government is not left with much choice. It cannot introduce new taxes in fear of more Issa Daqshekk campaigns. It has stressed that fuel prices will not increase either. Thus, one may ask, how is the government going to tackle its financial problems?
Over the past year or so, the government has tried and succeeded in part to curb abuses. Greater enforcement on tax collecting and coming down on those who are receiving social benefits when they should not are good initiatives, yet most of the time serve only to make good PR for the government. In the meantime, those who are really getting away with murder are smiling and happier than ever. What the government really needs to solve is the growing welfare gap. The number of elderly is increasing while the birth rate is on decline. A good chunk of government expenditure is absorbed by social benefits. What is taking the government so long to come out with a new Social Welfare structure?
In five days’ time, when Mr Dalli gives his budget speech, the majority of those listening to the Finance Minister will be asking: If we, the middle class workers, are not going to be taxed even more, if fuel prices are going to remain the same, where is the money going to come from?
The Nationalist government has reached a very delicate stage two years after the people gave it a mandate to govern this country. There are so many issues at stake that a simple solution does not exist. Mr Dalli has been meeting the Social Partners over the past months. Their suggestions have been put forward – except the GWU which has not participated – in the hope that they will be given due consideration. How many of those suggestions Mr Dalli will implement still has to be seen. However, the writing is on the wall. And the government had better start reading before it is too late.

Let there be light!

Enemalta is really having a bad time. First the oil crisis, increased expenditure and more than Lm26 million in outstanding bills yet to be collected. And now, an explosion at the Marsa power station that left half the country in pitch dark and without a water supply.
Things that happen. Well in this small island of our these things should not happen at all. The effects the blackouts have had on the economy are enormous. How many establishments lost important business and revenue apart from the cost of foodstuffs or equipment by the sudden surges in electricity? How many household appliances, especially computers, were damaged? How many precious man-hours were lost, especially in the Valletta and Floriana areas on Monday?
Who is going to answer these questions? Judging by the way matters are run in this country, no one.