Three years after Malta joined the EU, what has happened to the much-touted New Spring, bar of course the ubiquitous fireworks bonanza at the end of every April?

It seems, even going by the government’s own statements, that the government itself is rather unsure of what has become of the huge improvement in quality of life that constituted the main reason why many people chose to vote for EU accession.

The only improvement we are told about seems to be the much better roads being built, sometimes with Italian help and sometimes with EU funds. But we did not really need to become part of the EU for us to learn, finally, how to build roads properly.

This government, on the contrary, must be setting some kind of record for itself the way we keep getting warnings and infringement procedures regarding what it was committed to but did not implement with regard to the environment.

And possibly, worse is still to come as regards the real impact of EU accession on our agriculture given the continued heavy turnover and exodus of officials who should have, but have not, created the infrastructure to channel our way what little help there is from CAP.

Soon, unless, that is, the political considerations that may impede Cyprus’ accession to the euro sweep us in its wake, we will be joining euroland. This has, so far not been a bed of roses at all, seeing we had to draw back, and then some, the huge deficit we were nurturing. It has been a tough and painful experience, but, like all slimming exercises, it has been salutary overall. Even so, there must be no let-up, since even the figures provided by the government are based on some optimistic scenarios which may, and may not, happen.

But if we look around, we will be hard put to see any signs of a New Spring around us. What wealth has been generated is still not filtering down to the middle and lower classes, who, on the contrary, have been clobbered with heavier taxation and the far too heavy electricity surcharge. Most of the roads, especially in the towns and villages where, to be fair, the responsibility for them are mainly the local councils’, are still as potholed and neglected as they always were. The country is still in dire need of a good clean-up, especially City Gate, which in no way can be perceived to be a European country and not a Third World one.

Even what impetus there has been over the past years in the educational sector to promote freedom of movement and circulation within Europe seems to be petering out as the educational system lurches from one pointless reform to another and literacy figures remain mostly as they were and the number of post-secondary school students increase but not by that much.

And one of the main drivers of European growth, R&D, is noticeable in Malta by its absence, as seen by the recent Competitivity Report. Up until the most recent change in the MCST structure, Malta was nowhere present except with signal exceptions in the FP6 and FP7 programmes.

Malta is still far below the horizon as regards the presence of Maltese, except for institutional posts, in the European institutions. Nor does there seem to be a queue of people wanting to make a career for themselves over there – in fact there is an equally high turnover of people in this area. It is also rather difficult to see if and how things will change with a change in government, as perhaps there will be even fewer people on that side attracted to such posts.

What, then, did we join the EU for? There may be some cogent reasons but they are not readily apparent to most people. On the contrary, such painful phases of accession, including any coming inflation surge due to the introduction of the euro, and possible job losses when the State subsidies structure is dismantled, have not been countered by significant improvements that have a direct impact on people’s lives.

Mainly, however, it also seems that the current disenchantment with Europe is not one felt by only the Maltese, nor by people in accession States, but also across the continent, as evidenced by the French presidential election but also that in Poland and elsewhere.

The Maltese, fireworks and all, have somehow become a rather euro-enthusiast country, perhaps for all the wrong reasons. This is all the more an incentive to make EU membership meaningful to people.