It has actually been quite surprising, the EP and local council election campaign kicked off towards the end of March, yet the mud only started to fly in the last week or so.

This being an EP election and a local council election, one might have expected the focus to be on the individual candidates. For a while it was, but as election fever began to bubble, the big faces from the main political parties became involved.

What is completely perplexing is that rather than focus on what can be achieved by individuals on behalf of the people they are representing, we have gone national.

It’s actually mind boggling. Malta has been quite lucky insofar as the extent of the recession- although the description by some off our shores claiming us to be a recession Riviera might be a bit exaggerated.

What is certainly not acceptable is for the political parties to both build up this artificial frenzy and disrupt daily goings on at a time when people desperately need a feel good factor to offset increased electricity bills, shorter working weeks and uncertainty over tourism related jobs.

Even during the best of times, national elections cause uncertainty and it’s our own fault for allowing ourselves to be sucked into the parties’ game. It has, unfortunately degenerated into tit-for-tat.

The Nationalist Party is fighting tooth and nail to at least retain two seats, while the Labour Party is intent on keeping the majority it retains in the Maltese contingent of the EP.

Sadly though, we have seen valid and not so valid candidates from various parties dragged through (and dragging each other through) the mud with statements flying hither and thither. This newspaper is letting the people judge.

Unfortunately, politicians and political parties do not seem to realise that they sometimes try to set the agenda, yet ultimately, it is the general public who decides what they want to talk about.

If the public brings up and issue and discusses it on electronic fora, then the parties should sit up and take note. Politicians in this country tend to try and sweep things under the carpet and say they are not important and that we should be talking about other things.

But the upper echelons of both Red and Blue must accept this fact. It is useless to keep banging on about illegal immigration and museum price hikes when the general public wants to talk about healthcare and the price of cars. The moral of this is that political parties must listen to what the people yearn for.

We must do away with the notion of “I understand better than you and I don’t want to discuss what is bothering you”. We can pick on two particular issues which are smouldering away, even though there have been attempts to put out the fire. The PM should give a full brief of the health care report and also address issues which people are raising in relation to utility bills and unemployment. On the other hand, the PL leader must allow people to question the issue of the cars he and his wife own.

It is not the media that is creating spin on both these issues, it is what people are talking about on every web forum, every old man’s bar, every bus stop and every street corner.

We are sure that if both sides stopped firing broadsides at each other and spinning issues and paused for thought, they might realise that they are really barking up the wrong tree.