Despite all the gearing up for the forthcoming local elections, despite the inevitable pictures of party leaders with their candidates, despite all the analysis that will follow, only one thing is certain about these local council elections. They will serve primarily as a barometer of the political apathy that prevails. They won’t tell us much about who will win the next general election, they won’t even necessarily tell us which the best councils are. These results will show I think a growing disillusionment with not only the political process, but also too much media spotlight on it.

I don’t know if politicians, local and national, realise they are being harmed by too much exposure. I think what we now want is less teatrin and more quiet government, both locally and nationally. People expect the administration to work but they don’t want to hear too much about it, unless there really is something new to say. That is partly why so many of us are put off by the news and only sort of watch it. There simply isn’t that much material for riveting news every day, and too much of it is still focused on what the blue or the reds are saying, doing or even thinking!

There have been some nice touches lately, like the Prime Minister going round listening to people’s view on how these €850 million from EU are to be spent. Politicians need to keep in touch, and the media does need to let us know they are keeping in touch, but we don’t to really need or want to know every time a political leader goes somewhere, unless of course it is something really newsworthy. When I half watch these media reports of political leaders at coffee mornings for example I really cringe. I mean great, let the political leaders go along and rally the troops! But is that new? First we see these women with looks of studious concentration as the leader talks about the economy, and then they wave their flags rapturously. It’s OK to see that stuff on the political channels but national news should be just that. I know the policy is to report whatever political leaders do, but I do think it is often more of a disservice than a service, if nothing new has been said and it was just a rally of the party faithful.

Of course if the Nationalists do badly Labour will pounce on the fact that Lawrence Gonzi has not won an election yet. If Labour do badly the Nationalists will gloat, even thought this time the areas can be considered more Nationalist than Labour. But actually people are just not interested in politics all the time as they were. There was a time when we had to be, but we have grown up as a nation. We still care passionately about issues, but not necessarily the red-blue tugs of war.

Many will not vote this time, particularly the Nationalist voters who are either not bothered, or disillusioned or just plain angry. Some will not vote to send a message, but many others just can’t be bothered. After all local elections won’t help people pay their enormous electricity bills, won’t help us make ends meet, and money is a big issue these days. People seem to have either too much or not enough. Many are just not coping and savings are being dug into. Appearances are still being maintained but only just.

And all the time we hear that fraud will be eliminated, yet we wonder whether all this will really, for once, translate into a better standard of living. And a better standard of living is a majority concern right now. It’s a concern if you are a pensioner, it’s a concern if you are a one-income family bringing up kids. It’s even a concern with two-income families who feel as if they’re always shoring themselves up against the inevitable floods that are coming?

Newspapers are only one barometer of what concerns people. On the whole, it’s the bread and butter issues that concern the popolin but the more middle class are getting passionate and political, but about different things. In fact, if you follow the very heated correspondence about the Tigne car park, or the Ta Cenc proposed development, or the Baroque or not Baroque house in Sliema, you realise that people passion is there but it is very, very focused now. And unless our politicians can tap into these areas they are going to seem irrelevant to people’s needs. The trouble is many politicians do work hard. But they are caught in a bubble in an ivory tower. They actually don’t have the time to stop, to think, to look and listen as much as they should. They think people are just moaning, but in fact people are shouting to them: “We want you to do politics differently. We want you to care about what we care about. We take it for granted that you work on the macro issues but within that our micro views have to be catered for too. You are not relevant to us any more, and even worse we don’t believe you care about what we care about.”

It really is time that we were bothered with any form of election no more than every three or five years. The most economical method would be to have them all together every five years, as this little town, which poses as a country, cannot possibly afford to do what much larger countries do. In this sense at least Alfred Sant was right about one thing when he complained about EU membership. We simply don’t have the resources, human or otherwise, nor can we afford to do the same level of work larger countries can afford to do.

We are small but our concerns are big. We are small but our minds are switching off politics as the populations of big countries are. Politicians have to act and have opinions about areas where people show their concern. Tigne. Ta Cenc. Where do our political parties stand? The people want to know before they stand foursquare behind the political classes again? Without this shift, elections particularly local ones will serve only as barometers of apathy. What an expensive waste of time...