The government did not take up the challenge made by Opposition Leader Alfred Sant. Actually, it went beyond.

A few days ago, Dr Sant had challenged the government to give workers more than Lm1.50 a week increase in their salaries, to halve the water and electricity surcharge, to remove the departure tax, to revise the vehicle registration tax and to reduce the financial burdens on elderly people at St Vincent de Paul. The government should do this, Dr Sant claimed, if it was to be believed that the country’s finances were on a sound footing. Otherwise, it would be tantamount to taking the people for a ride.

Dr Sant tried to raise expectations sky-high, perhaps thinking that the government would not have been able to reach them, and then come out criticising the Nationalists. Labour surely thought that, being the last budget before the election, the government would have dished out some goodies, but the MLP wanted the people to think that anything given in the budget would not have been enough to make up for the sacrifices the people have made over the past years.

The slogan the MLP came up with as soon as the budget for 2008 was presented by Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi last Monday must have also been coined at the same time that Dr Sant was making these challenges. Because the budget can be described in many ways, but the “too little, too late” tag given to Budget 2008 by the MLP is inappropriate, to say the least.

The government did not accede to any of the proposals that were made by Dr Sant. But the measures it announced go beyond what the Labour Party – and most of the people – was expecting too.

The wage increase was not higher than the projected Lm1.50 and the fuel surcharge was not halved as Dr Sant suggested, but the revision of the tax bands will leave all families with much more money in their pockets which they can use as they please.

The departure tax was not removed and neither was the vehicle registration tax revised, but the reform in the children’s allowance that will now mean that all children are accounted for is a measure that will positively affect thousands of families.

The elderly living at St Vincent de Paul did not have their burdens reduced, but pensioners will receive the cost of living adjustment in full for the first time ever, and those who decide to continue working after they retire will not have to worry about surpassing a certain income because all that they earn will be theirs.

The measures announced by the government were, in fact, more family-friendly than the suggestions that were made by Dr Sant. They will affect more people in many more ways, because not everyone travels or buys a car every year.

What was presented in the budget last Monday was much more than could be anticipated, and more so considering that in spite of the measures described earlier, the government is still projecting a deficit reduction of Lm20 million. Not to mention the heavy investment there will be in education and health, roads and the environment, culture and sport too.

To describe it as having been a budget that gave “too little, too late” means that the MLP was expecting the government to give much less than it actually did. It was certainly not little, and not late either, because a budget like the one presented last Monday could mean a swing in favour of the Nationalist Party just in time before the people go to the polls.

But, of course, the MLP billboards had already been prepared.