The people have spoken

Alfred Mifsud Sunday, 1 June 2014, 09:16 Last update: about 13 years ago

We had a weekend of elections and the people have spoken loud and clear.

On the local front, the MEP election results gave a huge endorsement to PL government and the thumbs down to PN Opposition to a degree much larger than one could reasonably have foreseen.

The PN can fool itself to its heart’s delight by rejoicing in the election – by a whisker – three MEP candidates whilst ignoring that, in the first count votes, it lost to the PL with an even bigger percentage margin than in its disastrous performance of March last year.

The message for the PN, if it wants to take it, needs little sophisticated interpretation and I quite agree with its leader that any analysis would be superfluous, because there is very little to analyse.

In fact, if such a report were to be written it could be condensed in one simple sentence: the PN lost because it has yet to accept the people’s verdict with humility and remember that it is in opposition.

At least up until last weekend, the PN still had not accepted the role given it by the electorate at the last general election. It still operated as if it had a God-given right to govern. It behaved in defiance of the people’s mandate as if, by obstructing the government confrontationally and spreading doom and gloom even where there is evidence of daybreak, it was pursuing God’s will to be restored to government irrespective of the will of the electorate.

This attitude suits the PL well in the short term, but too much of a good thing could be deceptive. The PL must guard against over-confidence and must proceed as if its majority is a mere handful.

In many ways, while giving a resounding endorsement to government policies, the people were also protesting against the PN’s defiance. Labour’s exceptional performance is a mixed result of its own merits and the deficiencies of its opponents. It can control the former but not the latter.

Last weekend’s MEP elections had significance beyond our shores. There had been some trepidation that mainstream parties would lose ground to radical protest movements.

Protest parties did well in some areas. The UK Independence Party (UKIP), whose leader had predicted “an earthquake” in the election, came first in the UK. France also saw an “earthquake” – the phrase used by the French prime minister to describe the first-place performance of the country’s Front National, which advocates the dismantling of the eurozone.

In Greece, first place went to Syriza, a party opposed to the austerity measures that have accompanied the country’s bail-outs. Protest parties made gains in many other countries, not just in the periphery but also in ‘core’ eurozone countries – including Germany, where a breakthrough was made by Alternative fuer Deutschland, a new party that favours a eurozone break-up. It probably demonstrated little awareness of how much Germany has gained from the euro through avoiding the loss of competitiveness it would have suffered from the appreciation of the Deutschmark if it had still had its own currency.

But we had surprises on the Europhile side as well. Matteo Renzi in Italy showed what can be done by a young leader who offers the sort of political leadership the Italians have long been yearning for; the leadership that Berlusconi had promised but failed to deliver.

There is so much in common between Prime Ministers Renzi and Muscat:

· Both are leaders of socialist parties.

· They are roughly of the same age.

· They are both having their first experience as prime minister.

· They were both chosen to lead their party when it was practically unelectable.

· Both worked miracles in turning around the fortunes of their party. They accept a challenge and go head-on to win it.

· They communicate exceptionally well to deliver unity of purpose.

· Both command an appeal beyond the traditional boundaries of the party they lead.

· Both are strong pro-Europeans.

· They both believe that growth not austerity is the solution to Europe's problems

· Both want Martin Schultz to be the next Commission President.

· They both fight excessive bureaucracy and let nothing stand in the way of getting things done.

· They are both election winners.

· They lead the only two EU governments that have been roundly endorsed by their electorates in last weekend’s MEP elections.

It is a pity that the other main socialist Prime Minister in Europe seems cut from a different cloth. It is indeed worrying that, in an important country like France, the main political force is now the far right Front National of Le Pen, whose policies are ultra-nationalistic and bent on dismantling everything that true Europeans have built over the last six decades during which the continent has enjoyed an unprecedented period of peace and economic development.

Why is the French electorate behaving so differently from those of Italy and Malta?

The simple answer is because President Hollande is failing to deliver on his main campaign promise to be a valuable counterweight to the power of Chancellor Merkel in the EU Council of Ministers. Where it matters, Merkel is still calling the shots and preaching the merits of austerity and expecting all EU countries to become perfect images of the motherland. This does not work. The EU is a union of nation states with their own individual identities who wish to share their economic fortunes in a spirit of social solidarity.

Following last weekend’s result, France would do well to team up with Italy and Malta and seek support from other states whose economic growth is being restricted by misplaced austerity measures. They should join forces to press Germany and other core euro countries to let the European Central Bank (ECB) operate autonomously according to its mandate and lift the pressure for it to fight non-existing inflation and be able to do whatever it takes to save the euro and repair the transmission mechanism which is blocking the delivery of its monetary accommodation measures to the places where it is most needed.

Without growth sourced by efficient credit markets for Italy’s SMEs, Renzi cannot deliver. He needs to use his newly-acquired political capital to bring a fresh approach to the EU’s economic management in the second semester when Italy enjoys the Presidency. That is the most effective and apt response to the significant protest vote delivered by European electors last weekend. They must be listened to and Europe must change.

Countries in the eurozone must not only share their currency, they must also share their economic fortunes. Those that are not prepared for this must graciously exit the common currency so outside the core currency bloc, the EU becomes a looser arrangement as demanded by voters in the UK and Denmark. This double act of deeper integration at the core and a looser arrangement for the periphery is the only way in which the EU can remain relevant.