For all those looking for a better tomorrow, here comes the hardest part. For all those who know things can be better, that standards can be higher, that the country can be healthier, fairer and more representative, a challenge lies before you. Your dream can only come through if you fight your corner.

Malta and Gozo are crying out for you. A candle burns inside you; it is a flame which has been suppressed. In your own way, you have seen the little injustices of life, of country and system. Before this overwhelming machine, which some call a system, and which others call life, you feel helpless.

The greatest possible injustice, however, is that you do not even try to contribute to the solution. It is an injustice not only to yourself but also to others. Do not look only at others to save you, though you are not alone.

Many people have found opportunity and success in the last few years, but a great many others have been left behind. I am one of those people that have been left behind, and I have spoken up so that I am not ignored.

I have been made to feel like I do not belong – because to belong, I need to pledge my lifelong allegiance to one big party or another, and to never question that things could in fact be done better than the leader's vision. To join one party and follow one leader, there is an unwritten rule that I must hate the other.

Personally, I just want some respect. I want to be treated equally in spite of my beliefs, and to have a bit of peace and quiet. I do not want to have to leave my country to look for it – this is my home. Right now, I feel like a persecuted underground minority for being an independent thinker. If you feel the same, please speak up. If you do not feel the same, speak up too, because otherwise nobody will know what needs fixing.

Speak up in such a way which excludes nobody, or we will not find that consensus on how to move forward and fix things. Let us agree to find the solution together; all of us – all Maltese and Gozitans and foreign residents.

I am open to talking with you, whoever you are. If you are unhappy, something is wrong, is there anybody out there, you wonder. The answer is yes, you matter, and democracy gives you as much right as any Member of Parliament to be heard.

If you do not speak up, if you do not make yourself heard, then the world will be less for it. If you have an ideal, fight for it with empathy. It is easy to complain. The hardest part is to do something about it.