Before the first hour of 2013 had elapsed, I was at Mater Dei Hospital to pick up my daughter who had accompanied a friend of hers there after an accident.

On our way home, still shocked after what had happened, I heard her mutter from the back seat “2013 is going to be a bad year”. I tried to console her, telling her that one bad hour will not necessarily be followed by a bad year.

But her prophecy turned out to be the correct one.

***

There was a time when politics took a break during the Christmas season.

Not so this time, as we had the citizenship scheme talks going right up until two days before Christmas Day – which meant that on Christmas Eve the front pages of the newspapers were all about the failed negotiations between the government and Opposition.

It is a pity that no consensus was reached on the issue. The changes made by the government only served to make the selling of the passport more expensive, but the concept that Malta is giving out citizenship to make a quick buck was not altered, and this is what ultimately led to the collapse of the talks.

Added to this, we had the government choosing 23 December to deliver the news that Arriva were pulling out of the country and that the government will be taking over the running of bus services as from 2 January until a new operator is identified.

It was the government’s intention from day one to come to the point when Arriva calls it a day, and the circumstances – such as the summer fires on bendy-buses – helped to make this mission much easier. Labour sees the end of Arriva in Malta as a victory against the Nationalists and in particular against the PN minister they disliked the most, Austin Gatt. The hope now is that the new service will be better.

All this also meant that, this time, the two major political parties have remained active in the festive season. For many years they used to issue statements saying that they would refrain from attacking each other once Parliament rose for the Christmas break and until it resumed its sessions in January. They said they were doing so to allow families to celebrate the festive season in peace. This year, neither of them did so, which means that they kept their options open.

Last year, right in the middle of the government crisis, the start of the election campaign had been postponed to allow the festivities to pass without politics being slammed down our throats. Although talk of the impending election was inevitably the main subject over turkey and mince pies, the two parties officially stayed away from controversy.

The only exception in 2012 was the Labour Party’s election for a new deputy leader after the previous one had been unceremoniously sacked.

Businesses – hotels, shops and restaurants – were the first to congratulate them on this state of affairs, as they were the ones who stood to gain the most from a politics-free situation. But they did not say anything this year in spite of a reversal in the trend. It is another sign that they are becoming scared of speaking up even when things do not go their way.

There is another thing that stood out this week – the decision taken by the Prime Minister not to deliver his annual speech to the nation on Christmas Eve but on New Year’s Eve.

There is more to it than meets the eye. Some have said that it is just his way of being different, to establish new traditions, to be remembered as being the one who changed the status quo.

But my interpretation goes beyond this. I think that he did so with a purpose.

Christmas is a religious festivity; New Year’s Day is secular. By shifting his speech to the nation from Christmas Eve to New Year’s Eve, Dr Joseph Muscat is effectively making the statement that his government is totally secular, free from any religious connection. He is sending the message that his government is open to non-Catholics and non-Christians, that it is a government open to all religious denominations and, most of all, to minorities. The shift has the underlying meaning that it is a government that embraces the whole population irrespective of their religious beliefs and way of thinking. It also falls in line with what the Labour Party has portrayed itself to be in the past years – that of an all-inclusive movement. On this, Joseph Muscat is being consistent.

Like anything else, this decision has its pros and cons. It is certainly welcome by the more liberal sections of our society and by those who have moved away from Catholicism or Christianity, or who were never Catholics or Christians in the first place. It was of course not well-received by the more conservatives and those who, in spite of changes to our society, still believe that religion should be part of our everyday life.

The change of date for the annual speech also ties in with what I was saying before about the citizenship scheme and Arriva and the lack of a political break for Christmas. Whatever the day or period of year, the government is doing business as usual.

***

We’ve come to the end of another year. I am glad this one’s over.

A new year starts on Wednesday. Like every other year, 2014 can be better, or it could be worse. Those who know me know what I am thinking.

May yours be better than the one that’s ending.

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