On Tuesday, the day after Richard Cachia Caruana was ousted, very little attention was paid, either in the House or in the country at large, to a short statement by the Minister of Finance about the Ecofin meeting he had just attended.
Not for the first time, this country has been starved of vital information when all around us other governments have been very open and informative with their media on the various difficult choices facing each country in the throes of the current euro-crisis.
Only two MPs from the Opposition asked questions.
Karmenu Vella made a telling point when he said that most of Mr Fenech’s statement resembled what one could learn by reading foreign papers.
And former premier Alfred Sant made quite an impressive speech, which went rather under-reported in the media, but which showed a very good grasp of what is going on. One may disagree with his point of view, but one can hardly flaw his arguments.
To all this (rather few) arguments, Mr Fenech replied with a rather anodyne statement. The previous week, when once again Dr Sant had stood up to ask why there was no statement issued after the latest agreement, in this case with regard to the Spanish banking system, Dr Gonzi had replied that things were not finalized yet and that when they were finalized, the House would be informed. Which presumably led to Tuesday’s short debate.
We have this problem with such so-called debates. They are no debates at all. There is just a statement, followed by two or so questions, followed by a short reply. Then the House gets on with what it calls its ‘business’.
This allows the government of the day to get away with murder. There is no space for more questions, more pressing, and more explanations.
As a result, the people at large have only a hazy idea what the euro crisis is all about, what is being done to solve it, and so on. There is simply no discussion on the issues involved. People side with Germany or with Greece as if they are siding with the national teams.
Dr Sant argued forcibly from a eurosceptic angle, but Mr Fenech did not, at least in our opinion, counter-argue from Ecofin angle. Nor have we been getting the ECB angle from the Governor of the Central Bank, to be honest, even though he sits on the Council.
Predictably, to be sure, the argument we hear most is how much Malta is exposed to as regards the Greek loan, and ditto on the other loans. That is not so academic as it seems, for a Greek default will wipe out our loan, apart from the contagion effect if Greece were to default and exit the euro, apart from the impact it will have on the Spanish, and even worse, the Italian situation.
This is not something a government, any government, can pooh-pooh. But there are even more fundamental issues involved and the government must make it clear to the country where it really does stand.
Where does Malta stand in the Ecofin meetings? What will be the Prime Minister’s stand at next Thursday’s and Friday’s European Council. The country cannot be fobbed off with a short interview on PBS news and a short statement the week after when so many issues are being discussed.
Fortunately, there is a broad consensus in Parliament regarding the main issues of the euro crisis, despite all the bickering between the parties. Hopefully, this will become evident in the forthcoming debate on the fiscal compact. Hopefully, too, the country will hear speeches that show that the speaker knows what he or she is on about.
Otherwise, the alternative is too bleak to envision: a country kept in the dark by its governing class, and risking so much in this rough sea that gets rougher and rougher.