Kudos to Foreign Affairs Minister George Vella for his no-holds-barred intervention in Parliament regarding the farce that is being played inside the House of Representatives to the disbelief of the few viewers who bother to watch its sessions on a routine day. The advent of television cameras was bound to have an immediate effect on MPs' performance, what with many of them seeking to leave a lasting impression on voters in their various constituencies, but the result is a parody of what the nation's highest institution should really be.

Dr Vella was emphatically clear about the need for MPs to pull their socks up and bring the house back to order, televised or not. There are just too many stand-up comedies occurring and it is hugely depressing to perceive that the perpetrators themselves do not even realise it is all going so badly for them personally and for the dignity of the very institution that they represent as elected members.

The pathetic vision of a Parliament struggling with itself "in an environment of bitter exchanges and quasi hatred", as Dr Vella aptly put it, is no TV spectacle. No doubt also much to Mr Speaker's chagrin, it is a shameful occurrence that denigrates the House and belittles most of the very good work that is carried out inside that brand new venue which is not only feeling the strain of unruly sessions, but also of bad workmanship in parts of the glitzy edifice. It looks as if some of the work carried out for the Piano project was hardly melodic.

It is true that parliamentary debate, especially inside the parliament of a hot Mediterranean country, is always bound to cause the mercury to rise, but it occurs elsewhere, including Westminster, the so-called 'Mother of Parliaments'. Way back in the mid-70s, Leo Abse, the late flamboyant Welsh MP who once incredulously called for the banning of rock singer Alice Cooper, wrote that Westminster is the power house transmitting "socially sanctioned aggression". He added: "It inevitably becomes the Mecca for all those who wish, even as they did in their nurseries, but now without fear of disapproval, to scream with anger, spit at their enemies, bitingly attack opponents, boldly hit out at wrongs, real and imagined."

Abse then went on to say that outside Dartmoor Prison and the armed forces, "there are no more aggressive men than those sitting in our Parliament" - words that ring a bell across the democratic world.

Journalists everywhere usually tend to look at Parliament from a cynical angle, at least those who do not partake in the same sad spectacle by reflecting it on their newspaper pages or in radio and television programmes. An angry parliament is a never a pleasant sight for those seeking intellectual debate. David Frost, whose remarkable career took him to parliaments and parliamentarians all over the globe, used to insist that an angry parliamentary debate has the same effect upon national events as a slammed door has upon domestic arguments. "It is emphatic, it is deeply, though momentarily, satisfying; and it settles nothing at all."

Of course in just a few days' time, MPs from both sides will be crossing the floor to kiss and hug as they wish each other a Happy Christmas.

* * *

Same yardstick?

Even though it's not supposed to be a commercial enterprise, it is good to see the Maltese Curia making a hefty profit of €1.3 million during its 2015 financial year.

With the Archbishop tweeting, albeit sheepishly after his incredible gaffe, his belief that the General Workers' Union should re-channel its profits from the jobless scheme to the workers, one is allowed using the same yardstick to ask whether the Curia's profits, which include neither the gargantuan revenue from its schools, parishes and religious orders nor that of the Gozo diocese, will now be re-channelled to the workers employed by the Curia or, even better, the jobless themselves. Perhaps they should also find the required funds to compensate the victims of priestly sexual abuse, who have been so callously left in the lurch.

One also has to bear in mind that the Maltese Curia has cut its expenditure by almost half a million euros thanks to reduced subsidies to such deserving sectors within the Church as the Foundation of Theology Studies, the homes for the elderly and its well-oiled media outlets.

* * *

Space can wait

While most of Europe goes through its trials and tribulations in the face of stagnant unemployment figures, an economic stalemate and social and political turmoil as a direct result of the overwhelming wave of immigrants and refugees, the European Space Agency has just approved another €346 million in what has been described as "desperately needed funding" for its not exactly successful mission to Planet Mars.

The money, granted by the 22 member states of the ESA (Malta has a cooperation agreement with the agency) as well as Slovenia and strangely, given its proximity to NASA, Canada, is part of a €10.3 billion package granted to the agency at the end of a two-day meeting in Switzerland last week. The funds will go to the ExoMars programme, a joint project with the Russian space agency Roskosmos. No sanctions applied here, because without the Russians, the programme would just vanish into thin air, not space!

According to the BBC, the biggest backers of the ESA are the UK and Italy, which offered €171 million and €82 million, respectively. Hmmm... the UK is on the Brexit runway and Italy is back to its familiar political instability after Renzi's addio. 

With the EU steeling itself for the hacking off of a huge chunk of income after the UK's departure and the widening rift over immigration and other policies, €10 billion-plus would certainly come in handy for Brussels.

Space, particularly hostile Mars, can wait. The millions of unemployed, the urgent process of immigrant and refugee integration, or popular opposition to it, and anti-Islamic and fascist terrorism measures cannot. The Maltese presidency will be docking head-on with all this, a mammoth space mobile threatening to tumble at any given moment. I am convinced our representatives chairing Europe for the next six months are able and willing to do their utmost to steady the craft, but the future hardly beckons unless the attention is seriously focussed on the EU's own citizens, who are on the warpath, rather than Martian sand dunes.

At this moment in time, Bowie's ageless classic Life on Mars should suffice.