On the face of it, this passport for sale scheme is one other main tool in the government’s bid to rake in revenue which it will then use to improve the quality of life of the citizens.

Another principal tool is to decrease the high energy prices so as to allow Maltese families to be able to enjoy a better quality of life.

The problem is, that while these are very worthy aims and the intention backing them stems from the real situation of many Maltese families, to use this passport scheme to get additional revenue will either have to be repeated over and over again or else fail in its declared aim.

In recent times, Malta has had the benefit of getting all those funds from the EU since accession.

One cannot say Malta squandered those funds as the EU is very strict to ensure compliance with standards and procedures.

However, one cannot refrain from asking two fundamental questions:

-         Can we say that the Maltese as a whole have improved in their quality of life as a result of these funds?

-         Had we had the opportunity to decide, would we have spent all that money on roads, and would we have tackled the roads up North as against the problematic roads all over the island?

So this goes to show that having additional funds to spend may not solve the inherent problems in the economy. We have seen how persons at the risk of poverty have increased these past years, despite all the bounty of EU funds, the financial services companies and online gaming companies that came here.

One may argue that the best reply to these questions is to ensure a high quality of utilisation of funds. That is true, but here again, we may not have given sufficient proof we are able to be careful with money even if, and especially, if it has come from a non-national source. The last years of the Gonzi administration and the first months of the Muscat administration have shown, in one way or another, glaring episodes of inefficient use of funds, not to say squandering of funds.

For all the talk that has been made of this hypothetical €1 billion from the sale of passports (we have not been told what is the timeframe for this or whether it will be a recurring revenue) the uses to which these funds will be set to have been rather vaguely sketched.

Whatever. In this regard, Malta is going counter to the acquired wisdom of so many other countries beset, just like us, by the biggest economic crisis in recent history.

It would have been easy for them, actually more than for us, to develop a special revenue stream and use it to plug the holes in the national budget, the increased expenditure on people out of a job, the decreased revenue from taxes, etc. For instance, countries with oil reserves, countries with far bigger exports than we can ever hope to have.

But the sanest among them did not do this: they did not rely on one-offs. They understood that it is only by doing something structural and fundamental with the economy, that they could hope to improve the economy sustainably.

The best example of this is Germany, thanks to the structural changes brought about by Chancellor Schroeder (for which he paid with his subsequent defeat at the polls).

Those countries, like France, which neglected to act decisively and structurally to address the real issues in their economy, or which relied on one-off bonanzas, later on came to regret their neglect.

Other countries, like Spain, which for many years relied on benign neglect or optimism that things would change, have had to bite the bullet and tackle the issues at the worst possible time.

The issue, as we see it, is not just the moral or otherwise value of the IIP, but also the ability of the country, from its leaders downwards, to tackle the real issues of the economy in a sustainable, structural, fundamental way.

Just as Malta may have not used to the best of its ability the funds it got from the EU, so too it may not have used, many years before, the funds it obtained from the British base except to set up a command centralised economy that sapped the vital spirit of the people.