The consultation exercise related to the publication of the Labour Migration Policy closed last Sunday.

In a statement, the Labour Party said that the government had received over 300 submissions from interested parties who made suggestions and offered opinions on the way forward.

It is strange that a statement related to the public's response to a government policy was issued by the Labour Party. It is a government matter, and we believe that it should have been the Ministry of the Interior, which is responsible for the policy, that should have released it. There should be a line between party and government activity but, as we have learnt in the last 12 years, this line is often blurred, or even crossed. Labour has never really understood that there is - or should be - a difference between government and party matters.

But, aside from this point, it must be said that it is good to note that the government received so much feedback. Constituted bodies, political parties and others expressed their views on the matter in the hope that what the government proposed will be fine-tuned for the better.

One common response was that this reform is long overdue, and that we could already be late in trying to control the situation which has engulfed the country.

Since the Labour Party was elected to government in 2013, its economic growth policy was by and large built on population increase, and this meant that foreign workers, most of them coming from outside European Union countries, came over to settle down in Malta and Gozo.

There was literally no control as thousands of foreigners took up jobs which were either being rejected by the Maltese, or else simply to fill up the gaps that our economy created. Former Opposition Leader Adrian Delia was among the first to highlight this situation, criticising the government for opening the doors without real control, with the result that the ever-growing population started to have deep effects on the everyday life - be it the infrastructure, energy, health and, as everyone can see on a daily basis, traffic.

The Labour Party ignored all this for years, first when Joseph Muscat was still Prime Minister and later when Robert Abela took over. It was only in the last year or two that the government finally realised that Malta could not continue to withstand the influx, and that something needed to be done to at least try to control the situation.

Now that the consultation exercise is over, the government would do well to take on board any suggestions that would go a long way to improve the original document. And since this matter is of national interest, and needs to be implemented smoothly, it should not be turned into a political football.

The Labour Party has tried its best to belittle the ideas of the Nationalist Party in this regard, maybe as a way to deflect attention away from the magisterial inquiries reform which it is bulldozing through all parliamentary stages at break-neck speed.

But Malta would be taking a better step into the future if there is more consensus on the way forward.