By the time this article went to print, it was not yet clear whether an agreement had been reached between the social partners in the Malta Council for Economic and Social Development on a package of reforms announced in the budget. But it is not the outcome of the negotiations that I wish to highlight as much as the lack of transparency with which they were conducted and the absence of “the public” from them.
First, the big picture. The Gonzi government has made it abundantly clear that it is going to push through structural and economic reforms which over the years have only been whispered about in the PN’s corridors of power. It is equally clear that the trade unions are going to fight tooth and nail to resist any change to the status quo. Fighting their corner with their ears close to the rumbles of the global market, employers know that unless this country changes its economic and industrial ways they will lose out in the competition stakes. Conclusion: this is an issue of national importance, touching the lives of each and every one of us.
Now, independently of whether an agreement has been reached over the last couple of days, how much information did you have about what these gentlemen were discussing around the table? The answer is next to nothing. For all the protests and endless reportage on the social partners streaming in and out of MCESD meetings, no real information has been imparted to the media and the public. We have been left completely in the dark about what is being discussed around the MCESD table, let alone what positions are being taken by the parties around it.
The initial bone of contention was the national and public holidays falling on a weekend. But government’s parting shot was that it was willing to negotiate as long as the aim was to reach agreement on a “package”. In other words, the decisions taken or contemplated on your behalf have one essential ingredient missing. You.
On Wednesday, the cherry was put on the cake by Victor Scicluna, the chairman of the MCESD. He told the media that the social partners had agreed not to divulge any information about the negotiations. Shockingly, he added that the media should follow suit. “Wait 48 hours,” he said, “so that you won’t prejudice these negotiations at such a delicate stage.”
Get the murky picture? First, no information was given to the public about these negotiations, what was discussed and how. We just saw a procession of men in regulation grey suits and ties waffling till kingdom come. Then, when the negotiations appeared to be heading towards a conclusion, the media and, by implication, the public were cautioned against seeking and circulating information.
This is completely out of line with the Europe we have just joined. Information about what affects people’s lives can no longer be hoarded by government or the social partners. That the negotiations reached a “delicate” stage is no excuse for keeping the men and women affected by them in almost total ignorance.
That the social partners around the negotiating table might want to keep mum about their respective positions is natural. Obviously, when it suits their organisations’ interests, or when it assists negotiations to move forward, the parties will refrain from saying anything publicly. And that is what one would expect them to do.
None of this, however, is an argument for preventing the media from doing its job of disseminating the facts and analysing them. Journalists have no obligation to ensure that the members of the MCESD reach (or don’t reach) agreement. That is the social partners’ job, not the media’s and it is completely unreasonable to expect a journalist to act as a prop for the social partners’ negotiations. They have a different, even conflicting, role to play because that is what best serves democratic practice. A journalist cannot take an oath of silence, not even when a matter of national interest is in the balance.
It is also high time to put the whole matter in a bit of perspective. It is not as if Malta is at war and a piece of information divulged by a journalist might endanger national security. Granted, the MCESD had a hard nut to crack. But for God’s sake, it was hardly the end of the world. Just because some, I repeat some, social partners are pathological drama queens, we are not obliged to go out there and buy tickets for their melodramatic performances.
My hunch is that the ease with which such lack of transparency is achieved has another root – the perverse nature of media ownership in Malta. We have got so used to political parties and unions owning media that we simply forget how corrosive it is to democratic practice, particularly in a situation like this one.
Think about the men sitting around the table. Government, an MCESD member, has its own party television, radio and newspaper which can be silenced with a phone call. The General Workers Union has its own widely read daily and Sunday newspapers, which can equally be silenced at the drop of a hat. Since what’s good for the General Workers Union is very often good for the Labour Party and vice versa, I very much doubt whether the latter’s media would publish or broadcast anything against the express wishes of the former. Worse still, if it suited the GWU, it could easily leak the information to the MLP, technically keeping its hands clean.
It is in this awfully anti-European media scenario that the MCESD chairman’s call for casting a blanket of silence over the media becomes even less acceptable. The chairman did not have to tell the journalists in front of him not to investigate what was being discussed and agreed on. His colleagues around the table would have ensured that their journalists, the ones whose paycheques they sign, would do their bidding.
Finally, what I find more surprising than the MCESD’s call for media silence is the journalists’ own silence following this declaration. At the time of writing, no journalist or Press Club has condemned what amounts to an interference in the execution of their duties. Imagine if this sequence of events happened in the UK, the US or Italy. The media would have had a field day. Until journalists in Malta treat themselves as professionals, with rights and duties, no one else will.
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