I am acutely aware it is too early for acceptance speeches. The PN’s final decision on who should lead it is yet a long way ahead. But I feel it is already time to express gratitude and humility as the party’s General Council, its highest organ, has nominated my friend and colleague Chris Said and me as candidates for the final choice of the party’s members.

I stand before the party members humbled by the great history of this party, by the commitment of its members and by the example of its current and its past leaders. I stand before them re-affirming the political values and principles that have, at every opportunity the PN had to govern Malta, built an equitable, just and prosperous society. I stand before them with an ambitious commitment of renewal that learns its lessons from the glorious history of the party: its liberating achievements and its inevitable mistakes.

Some have interpreted the ‘New Way’ theme of my campaign as an indictment of the old. This has been misunderstood: perhaps in the frenzy of the campaign of the last few weeks; perhaps because of the inevitable collective disappointment of losing our second general election in a row; perhaps because I have not yet successfully explained my vision in full.

If I thought that there was nothing right about the PN that asked the people’s vote in 2013 and in 2017, I would not have supported it then. I would not be offering to lead it now. I am running for the leadership of the PN because I believe in it: I believe in the people who have led it, in the people who worked tirelessly to put its programme forward and in the political principles that inspired them as they inspire me.

What I am offering is not an emptying of the party in order to occupy its shell. I am offering a revitalisation of the PN, an injection of a fresh and new energy, a renewal of commitment to our well established principles.

And I am under no illusion that I can ever do all this on my own. Nor am I under the illusion that I, or anyone, can hope to succeed without the experience, the maturity, the knowledge and the memory of all the people who have worked in the PN for so long.

I do understand that this campaign, fought in an unprecedented manner over the social media, has strained the cohesion of our party. All candidates had over-zealous supporters who made the mistake of thinking that supporting their candidate required them to attack the others. Although they were not acting on my brief, I apologise unreservedly to anyone who was made uncomfortable by over the top attacks of any of my supporters.

I have used every opportunity available to me to warn against behaviour that can alienate anyone from the PN. And I do so again. Because as soon as can be, our work must focus on attracting more people to our party, not chase away the ones that are already among us.

The role of leader of the PN has never been a title of royal authority. The role is to bring together the people who work in this party in all its ranks, energise them, mobilise them, synthesise their views and represent them in the only political dialectic that matters: the contrast with the Labour Party, its materialistic policies of egoism, its contempt for the rule of law, its complete blindness to the future.

To do this I will need each and every one of the PN MPs to focus their full energy on holding the government to account. On top of that I intend to build an academy of prospective candidates to prepare the next generation of PN MPs who will be mentored for the role by the present ones.

I will need the party staff to work tirelessly with a renewed sense of purpose to prepare the PN to fight the campaigns that are ahead of us. I will support them with a renewed leadership team to bring in new ideas on how to put our message across and how to fully utilise our employees’ creativity and initiative.

I will need the thinkers and the ideologues of the party to come together again to take a fresh look at what future beckons this country of ours and how we are to prepare ourselves for it. I will make sure they are supported by fresh, critical minds who will sharpen our debate and give us a new synthesis: a new chart for our future.

Mine is a new way that is not embarrassed of the old. It is its proud heir.

As we go over the last two weeks of this leadership campaign, let us broaden our view. Let us look up from the inevitable introspection we have been going through since last June. Now that we have understood our mistakes let us carry them as badges that testify to our experience as a party and our readiness to serve the country now that we’re older and wiser.

There is something to be said for the old adage that ‘no one is greater than the party’. I know I am not. I am here to serve the shared ambition of building a better home for our children: an ambition that did not start last June but 140 years ago when this great party started its long journey.

Let us now continue this journey together.