Barely four months have passed since the general election, and the tune has already changed, as the country is being asked to forget what it was promised. During the campaign, Labour embarked on a bonanza of promises, with a yearly €1,000 super bonus, a metro to rescue us from the traffic and a government that, in Robert Abela's own words, would continue to be our shield. With Budget 2027 due on 26 October, the music has changed key, and rather abruptly at that.

Clyde Caruana is playing a very different tune indeed, as he now calls the super bonus a work in progress, not yet ruling out new taxes. On the metro, he admits that the studies his colleagues quoted on the campaign trail have yet to reach his desk, and that he remains unsure whether the country can afford the project. "These promises can only materialise if they make numerical sense," he said this week. Well, Mr Finance Minister, right you are, yet one might have expected that test to be applied before the promises were made.

The deficit is heading for 2.8 per cent, and the energy crisis has already cost €1.35 billion, yet none of this appeared overnight. Only last year, the Prime Minister boasted that we had had election budgets one after the other and he told us to prepare ourselves for more. Now where have we heard that before? The only thing that has changed since then are the pages of the calendar.

This is the first budget of a new legislature, the moment when a government has both the political capital and the time to take difficult decisions and start thinking of the important matters in our economy, matters that have been brushed under the carpet for far too long.

The Malta Chamber of Commerce, Enterprise and Industry has spelt out why these decisions cannot wait. Between 2015 and 2025, our Gross Value Added grew by 81.9 per cent, yet 68.9 points of that growth came from simply adding more workers and a meagre 3.1 from genuine productivity gains. Real GDP per hour worked actually fell between 2021 and 2025, leaving Malta 21st out of 27 member states for productivity growth.

By the minister's own figures, our domestic labour supply grows by around 3,000 workers a year while demand exceeds 10,000, and the population could reach 800,000 by 2040. To add insult to injury, according to Clyde Caruana, businesses keep hiring because labour is cheaper than investing in capital. Well, that's quite rich, Minister Caruana, considering the labour market framework was built by successive Labour administrations that pursued volume-driven growth, and it is hardly reasonable to place the full burden on employers now that our physical and infrastructural limits are being reached.

A serious budget would start by admitting that the problem exists. Had the government heeded the warnings, and invested seriously in renewables, efficiency and storage, Malta would today be far less exposed to international energy shocks.

A serious budget would reward automation, digitalisation and upskilling through incentives that businesses can actually plan around and finally open the conversations that budget after budget have shoved aside: pensions, planning, mobility, procurement and the governance of our institutions.

People deserve a government that tells them the truth before an election as well as after it. But the music has now changed key. What Malta needs now is someone willing to take the economy seriously.

Dr Darren Carabott is a PN MP