The debate on the euro has increased in its importance over the past weeks as Malta prepares to change over from the lira to the euro. While there is no question or argument that the euro is to be our legal tender come 2008, and this will be beneficial to Malta, I would like to propose that all traders should round downwards the euro exchange when compared to the lira.

This should happen for a year, at least. I do see, already, shops displaying an exchange rate which is above the given rate. This is not right, and certainly nobody can blame it on the government.

However the few persons who damage each sector must be checked at once. We do notice that the opposition media comes out showing various shop chits, wherein an exchange rate is inflated. Besides seeing that the only platform of objection seems to be these shop chits, this euro business can be an election issue. Therefore, prudence and checking should be the norm of the day.

The other day, in Sliema, we witnessed a good part of the police force descend on hawkers who were plying their trade in the area. They did so, I am told, after some person complained. Without going into the merits of how the raid was conducted, the whole issue was on whether the hawkers are staying 50 metres away from the nearest shop.

In our district, hawkers are very convenient as, after smaller grocers closed down due to the supermarket era, they come behind our doors, offer their products – even at prices which are slightly higher than usual – at times of the day convenient to us and deliver the goods to our doors. It is not that this is some kind of social service, but for the elderly, the sick and the worker, all this has a fantastic value.

The police wanted to stop all this because of petty infringements. What I do ask is for a revision of the law. Seeing that times have changed, the law should be revised so that a hawker can stay within, say, 25 metres of a shop. The introduction of such a law in the past, I suppose, was so that a hawker would not obstruct the shop’s business. Understandably that was correct thinking. But times have changed. An equitable solution can be found, especially in the interests of residents, whom we all claim to serve.

By contrast, on the Strand we do have another type of hawkers, who within 50 metres of shops, are serving clients and not being taken away. What were taken away were ticket booths used by cruise operators that held no licence or permit. Now, with no alternative solution offered, foreign clients, our tourists that is, have to sit on the pavement to get served before boarding their ship. Or employees use their own attache cases to serve tourists.

Hardly a good impression.

Robert Arrigo is a Nationalist MP