opinion

Whatever happened to the heroes? Whatever happened to New Labour?
(With apologies to The Stranglers)

TILL SOME TIME AGO JAMES DEBONO THOUGHT THAT THE LABOUR PARTY WOULD SPEND ITS FIRST TWO YEARS IN OPPOSITION WINNING BACK THE OLD LABOURITES WHILE ADOPTING THE NEW LABOUR IMAGE OVER THE NEXT THREE

Labour Contradictions
The Labour Party is promising that if elected it will abide by the EU’s environmental regulations. It had even copied the Green Party's Summer Campaign in favour of clean beaches and during visits to the polluted sites, Labour exponents were promising to solve the sewage problem if elected.

Where will the money to solve all these problems come from? Not from the Structural and Cohesion Funds of the European Union. "We do not need foreigners’ money to solve our problems. We are good enough to solve our problems on our own. We do not suffer from an inferiority complex," so goes Labour's reasoning. So where will the money come from? Will a new Labour government introduce new taxes? Of course not. "The Nationalist Party has introduced 300 (according to some even 44,000) new taxes. We promise that we will not introduce any new taxes on the impoverished Maltese worker."

Therefore, the impoverished Maltese worker will nevertheless carry on swimming in ‘s***’ if Labour does win the next election!

The Labour Party is the party against animal cruelty and its Franciscan animal welfare bill was not bad at all and it should have been discussed in Parliament too. During the debate, the MLP even expressed its concern about the welfare of animal foetuses! The MLP seems to be concerned with the welfare of all animals except with the welfare of birds! What's the difference between shooting an amphibian, reptile, mammal or bird for fun?
In the MLP's worldview some animals are more equal than other animals.

The Labour Party has abandoned Parliament because the debate on the La Salle motion was judged to be anti constitutional while on the Fourth of July Labour MPs were feasting on an American warship in our ports. I cannot understand the difference between a warship in our ports and a warship in our docks.

Can you love someone you are brought up to hate? The Labour Party says that it wants the best relationship with European Union and at the same time it attacks it. Dr Sant went as far as to say that through the European Union the aspirations of traditional German nationalism will be achieved. How can we have the best relationship with the EU when half the Maltese people are being indoctrinated to hate it? The Labour Party, even in its worst days, was a reformist party. It was the party associated with progressive change. The opposition to the European Union has derailed the party and, in order to oppose this change, the Labour Party had to embrace a national-patriotic discourse that is inherently conservative.

VAT contradictions
I cannot understand why the Nationalists are criticising the Labour Party for changing its stance on VAT. It is very positive when parties are non-dogmatic and are able to change their positions from time to time. It is very positive for the country that there would be no change to the taxation system if the MLP wins the next election. Hopefully after the next election the MLP will also change its position on EU membership!

Paranoid
One of the positive aspects during the Sant interlude in government was the professional way in which the police used to treat protesters. That's the main reason why I prefer New Labour to Old Labour. Even when police were provoked by candle throwing KSU students back in 1998, they kept their cool. In other countries police would have gone berserk! It is strange that the police are once again becoming paranoid about protests. 150 policemen were sent to keep twenty Graffitti activists from getting near an American ship! Some months ago the police even went as far as to search the computer files of two activists after they stuck a couple of posters to a bus stop! Two journalists were recently arrested for taking photos from the roof of a private residence during a Greenpeace protest. Freedom of assembly is one of the most sacred rights in a democratic society. China is one of those countries in which the right to protest is repressed. That is why China is not a democratic country.

Light a candle for freedom!
If you believe in human rights, tomorrow at 7:00 pm join the Green Party in a peaceful vigil in front of the Chinese embassy in St Julians. Hopefully the Prim Minister and other Nationalist politicians who have built their political career on denouncing the abuse of human rights in Malta will also raise the question of human rights in their meetings with the Chinese President. If they fail to do so, I can't but shout: You hypocrites! You spineless bootlickers! You unprincipled cowards!