The debate about the budget, which took up three weeks of parliamentary work, is over.

The House of Representatives, after an additional two days of discussion on the Fort Chambray project, will now take a three-week break over the Christmas period before resuming its functions on 10 January.

Since the budget was presented by Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi on 24 November, the government and opposition have been involved in rather harsh exchanges as to how the country is being administered.

The opposition, fulfilling its role, criticised all there is to criticise, while the government tried hard to defend what there is to defend, while highlighting its past achievements and plans for the future.

All in all, the discussion on the budget has left no one any the wiser.

Luckily, gone are the days when all the budget debates were transmitted live on television.

Only the presentation of the budget itself, the opposition leader’s criticism and the prime minister’s reply are now shown on TV.

The debates concerning the respective ministries are broadcast only on radio, and it would be interesting to know how many listeners there were.

Few were the occasions, during the budget debates, when the opposition had something good to say about the administration and, in many instances, a word of praise was quickly followed by another comment to tone it down. Likewise, government members were at times more concerned with attacking the opposition rather than explaining what they had in mind and the reasons that led to certain decisions.

The problem in Malta is that, unfortunately, too many people think that everything the government does is right and, on the other hand, too many people think that what it does is all wrong.

Although there has been an improvement in the way people respond – after all, it is the issue at stake that is important, and not who is trying to implement it –

generally speaking we are still far from thinking with our minds.

Instead, the great majority of us still believe that one side is always correct and the other is always wrong, irrespective of the matter on the country’s agenda.

These people still fail to realise that there is a lot of grey in between what is white and what is black.

No government does everything right; no government does everything wrong, either. In the same way, the opposition does well to criticise the government on certain matters, but there are occasions when its criticism is not justified.

In a statement issued earlier this week, the Nationalist Party has pledged to stop all political activities between 19 December and 9 January to enable Maltese families to enjoy the festive season without political controversy. It is the sixth year that the party has taken this initiative. At the time of writing, the Malta Labour Party has not said whether it will follow suit.

Naturally, every political party is free to do what it thinks is best.

On the one hand, the PN’s gesture is welcomed because, at least for three weeks, it wants to keep politics – so dominant in our lives – out of Maltese homes. The move could, however, be interpreted as an attempt to divert the people’s attention from the problems the country is facing at this moment in time.

On the other hand, the Malta Labour Party does not want to halt or slow the momentum it has been building in its criticism of the government, which culminated in the protest walk-out from parliament in the last sitting dedicated to the budget debate on Wednesday.

What is certain is that politicians should be the first to set an example of mature politics.

It is only if they lead the way that there can be a change of mentality in the way we tackle politics.