Rather than extending our citizenship to all those who can pay, as a country we should be reviewing the ramshackle and lackadaisical way we hand out citizenship of Malta if we really appreciate the value of being a citizen of Malta.

For many years now, we have assisted at all kind of subterfuges entered into by those who would want to stay in Malta and benefit from the advantages of staying here.

We can offer a balmy climate, an affluent way of life, a safe environment and quite adequate connections to the rest of the world. Each of these advantages makes Malta doubly attractive for people who lack any or all of these.

Since we must think that these advantages, which come free, can be shared around, we seem to have concluded we can offer them around to anybody and everybody because being free offering them to others will not cost us anything.

We are a small island but since we get all these things (and more) for free, we think we can build as much as we like and it will not affect the environment, we can get as many cars as we want and our roads will not be clogged, and we can get in as many people as we can since the more the better.

For many years, checks and controls had been in place to stop people who had no right to be here, from coming in. Then we joined the EU and all frontiers were immediately opened. Before that, we had the six-penny settlers but they mostly kept themselves to themselves and did not impact the rest of the country.

Huge breaches appeared in our bastions. The widest one was the marriage one because for many years until we got wise to it, we offered instant citizenship to any foreigner who married a Maltese, usually a girl. Anyone could see this was an invitation to arranged, fake, marriages, otherwise called marriages of convenience. The foreigners, newly-Maltese, then proceeded to get in as many of their extended families as they dared.

WE have now reached the point where huge non-Maltese communities have come in and we have lost all control over who comes in. The fact that the government of the day is now proposing to get in even more people as long as they pay is a sign that the government is now giving up on any kind of controls over who gets to come in. The government itself says there are more than 1,000 immigrants who have no legal right to be here and, words apart, nothing is done to get them out.

Apart from the boat people, there are numerous people with no real right to be here. We are very lax – when was the last time one saw police stop and question people on the street demanding to know by what right they are here? But this is exactly what happens in other countries, which have more space, more resources, to offer and yet they are far more careful than us about offering their citizenship.

We offer citizenship automatically whereas other countries insist on a tough written exam, an understanding of the basic principles on which the country is run. We offer citizenship for free, whereas applying for citizenship in countries such as the UK costs real money.

The government’s IIP proposal does not even include a minimum period of residency before citizenship is granted. Nor, for all hi’falutin’ words, do we have or will we have, anything regarding qualifications.

And to top it all, citizenship here takes the form of a paper, a certificate, handed out by an official in the most humdrum manner, whereas other countries, such as the US and UK, have a full ceremony with an oath being taken.

Collectively, we should be shot for having allowed our citizenship to get debased so much. To offer it to those who can pay makes it even more patently base.