The first Budget of this legislature is now exactly one month away. On 26 October, Finance Minister Clyde Caruana will take the stand in Parliament and address the nation to outline what the government's roadmap is going to be for the next 12 months.
This will be the first Budget of the legislature which started last June, and many will be looking forward to see what from the Labour Party's general election manifesto will make it into the Finance Minister's speech.
Eyes will no doubt be on whether proposals such as the yearly €1,000 so-called 'super bonus' that the Labour Party announced with much fanfare during the electoral campaign will make it into the Budget for 2027.
However, the country's priorities today go far beyond whether people will get a bonus or not - there are far greater issues at hand and that the government must look towards handling.
The first, as the National Commission for the Promotion of Equality pointed out on Friday, is Malta's alarmingly low birth rate, which stands at 0.98 and is the lowest in the European Union.
This was already the subject of several significant measures in the last Budget that offer financial incentives, including by revising tax brackets and increasing the children's allowance.
But starting a family is a lot more than just financial incentives. The real key is offering improvements to the quality of life of parents, and that must come by offering measures for a better work-life balance.
The next Budget must reflect this and take it into consideration. Prospective families need to know that if they do have children, then the measures to support them must be there.
The NCPE called for the increase of paid parent-related leave entitlements, specifically by extending maternity leave to six months, paternity leave to four weeks, and parental leave to six months on full pay, with three months allocated on a 'use-it-or-lose-it' basis. Moreover, legal provisions and structures supporting work-life balance measures, such as remote working and flexitime, should be strengthened and financially supported.
It is time for the government to decide what it wants to be: whether it wants to continue down the path of being obsessively pro-business, or whether it wants to prioritise the worker - even if it comes at the detriment of businesses.
The country's economic model then remains an area where there needs to be changed. It is clear that population growth must be controlled, and the common consensus is that the most effective way to go about this is by creating new high-value economic sectors.
People will be keen to see what the government is going to do in this regard.
A part of the population issue also revolves around tourism: the government must have a clear path on how it is going to divert towards quality tourism rather than the number chasing that currently makes up the industry.
The government's energy politics will remain stable: ergo, subsidies on fuel and electricity will remain - but Caruana has warned that the price of this is rising, and that in itself may well have an effect on the government's expenditure in other sectors.
So where will the priorities lie? What sectors will see a drop in spending and what won't? That will be another indicator of where the government wants to take the country.
It is a new legislature, and after a summer period where the government has been relatively quiet - at least compared to other significant news events that dominated the headlines - it will be the first moment where the spotlight is back firmly on Parliament.