I do not like thinking that the European Commission has a habit of picking on tiny Malta to flex its muscles when it needs to make a point or try a test case

With illegal immigration, for instance, the Commission has now definitely made it clear beyond reasonable doubt that it will flatly refuse to change its rules in order to apply more justice to the system of apportioning the responsibility of distributing immigrants around the EU. It is very clear that the stronger central and northern European countries prefer to leave the problem of illegal migration exactly where it arrives – that is, at the southern border of the EU.

The Commission also has the audacity to impose exceptionally generous immigrant reception-friendly policies on the southern receiving countries, with constant probing of their detention policies and with the occasional slap on the face by its human rights wing in the event that the migrant-receiving states are perceived not to fully comply with proper treatment policies. Of course, in the process it continues to resist a pan-European migrant reception-friendly policy for all member states.

Then you start thinking that indeed the Commission is strong with the weak and weak with the strong.

An issue that is currently closer to heart is the Air Malta restructuring saga. Whatever the reasons that have led the national carrier to its current financial problems, Air Malta is for the country not only a commercial enterprise but more significantly a tool of economic development. It has a strategic mission and is of great infrastructural importance to the country.

A Malta without Air Malta will be wiped off the global economy and it will sound the death knell to the national economy, with grave negative impacts on inbound and outbound tourism, and on our international trade. Sometimes I get the impression that most economic and political observers, as well as the Commission itself, look at Air Malta’s problems narrowly as merely ones that will have an impact on employment, preferring to consider downsizing of the workforce as a way of restoring commercial viability. But that is only a way of solving a part of the problem.

The real problem is wider. It is not only about how to keep Air Malta flying, but rather how to keep Malta flying in the global economy. That is why I fail to understand how the Commission carries on coercing the national airline into complying with its strict financial regulatory framework in its restructuring programme, denying, for instance, direct financial assistance to the national carrier as originally proposed by the government.

Air Malta accounts to 50% of seat capacity to Malta, with the other half taken up by other legacy airlines and low-cost carriers (LCCs). It is also the main cargo carrier to Malta. The national economy cannot afford to see Air Malta curtail its flight operations from destinations that have been its core markets simply because it will not have the necessary workforce to back them.

Air Malta does not only feed itself, but it feeds the national economy. Its infrastructural role is beyond reasonable doubt. Although LCCs have had a positive impact on our tourism industry, a market that is increasingly reliant on them is a volatile market. Malta pays LCCs to fly here, but LCCs are not paid to remain. If they pull out, as they have already done elsewhere, and with a smaller Air Malta footprint post-restructuring, the tourism industry will suffer and so will the greater economy.

I dislike that the Commission expects very high standards of compliance with financial regulations from a very small airline on the European stage but very big for the local economy, while it cares less about throwing tens of billions of taxpayers’ money at the faces of the floundering economies of the euro, with Greece and Portugal leading in the mess. Bailing out these economies – not because they have been victims of the financial crises but because they had expended unwisely – is far too much for me to stomach.

I care for my airline.

Dr Gavin Gulia is the Opposition’s Main Spokesman on Tourism and Air Malta