There’s no way one can deny that the government has done a lot, indeed all it could, to counter and solve social problems that exist here like they do everywhere else. Questions always remain whether this commitment has met with enough success.

The fact is that in budget after budget, measures adopted were prudently and, in my view, intelligently focussed to deliver on precise social goals ranging over a widely varied field.

However, I suspect that a main problem which has emerged goes as follows: Due to the strong growth rates experienced in recent years, social problems are developing differently from how they did in the past, and in ways that cannot be foreseen or correctly understood, since they arise from social conditions that are completely new.

If so, the government and even less the man in the street could fail to recognize in time how social problems that need to be faced have actually arisen. It also becomes less and less easy, given this situation, to design in quick time, the tools that would allow such problems to be cleared.   

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More on greed

A friend sent a comment on the subject of greed, mentioned in the blog previous to this.

He reminded me of a short story by Tolstoy (?):

In the American West when the territory was attracting many Palefaces wanting at all costs to own those “empty” lands, an Indian Chief made a promise to one of them. He would give him possession of all the land he could cover by running between dawn and sunset, provided that he would end his run just where he started it. The Paleface did as suggested and ran as far as he could to acquire as many broad stretches of land as possible.

Too late he realised that the sun was setting and that he was far away from where he had left. Desperately he ran back and kept straining so hard that his heart gave out. He died on reaching the starting line.

The Indian Chief declared: So the land that this Paleface really needed was the six feet of earth in which we shall bury him.   

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Gibraltar

The final hurdle to arise in the phase that has just been concluded in the Brexit negotiations, related to Gibraltar. The Spanish government considered that more attention should have been given to its stand over the Rock, considered by Spain as an integral part of its territory. As in the case of Ireland, UK membership of the EU had muted controversies over this issue.

Now, Gibraltar will be exiting from Union territory and theoretically, the frontier between it and Spain should harden.

It is not clear that the last-minute compromise found will carry over into the second phase of negotiations, that should mostly concern the future relationship between the UK and the Union.

The matter could have a direct impact on Malta. Quite a number of Gibraltar residents are descendants of Maltese families. Beyond this, firms established on the Rock will be attracted to relocate or otherwise, according to the future that will be decided for it.