The population predicament

I was listening to Nationalist leader Alex Borg when he visited the MaltaToday offices and sat down for a conversation with the newsroom. His demeanour is years ahead of former PN leaders. He does not confront people. He is pleasant and finds it comfortable speaking to people. Comparisons are odious but Borg was made to be a politician.

On delivery he scores 9 out of 10. On content, the score is not as high.

He faced a long list of questions and comments from the journalists who quizzed him on his policies and past declarations. They asked him about the four-day week, the planning reform, the Gozo bishop, Adrian Delia, the choice of chief justice and of course abortion.

Alex Borg was his usual self, careful not to say anything negative about Jason Azzopardi, Roberta Metsola or Adrian Delia. He was guarded when speaking about these politicians.

On some of the political statements he made there was a discussion, sometimes there were clear answers in other cases not so clear.

When it came to over population and the presence of third country nationals, his answers were not very convincing. He said that a new Nationalist administration would embark on a study to take a snapshot of the situation so that solutions can be tailored to the country’s needs. But solutions are what people want to hear about today.

Borg’s response—a study—to his own party’s battle cry on over population was not a very convincing way of addressing a main concern.

Malta’s present economic path and unstoppable growth, purchasing power and style of living has left us with an over-dependence on foreign workers. This is compounded by the fact that today’s education system does not cater sufficiently enough for vocational training, leaving Malta without an indigenous skilled labour force.

Trade schools were terminated decades ago by a Nationalist government and this created a vacuum that robbed the country of young skilled manual workers.

Alex Borg is well aware that people have concerns about overpopulation, yet he also knows that the population conundrum cannot be really solved. Unless he wants to bring Malta’s economy to its knees, closing the door on foreign labour is not an option.

He also knows that some of the concerns about third country nationals stem from having people of different colour and religion present in our communities not because they are robbing us of our jobs

Times have changed and I believe voters understand that we cannot do without third country nationals in our economy. From cleaners to waiters, from hospitality staff to bus drivers, from postal workers to construction workers, farm hands and even fishermen, foreign labour is propping up several sectors across the board. And this does not include nurses, carers and doctors, without which out hospitals and old people’s homes will collapse. The proliferation is widespread and also includes high-end jobs such as accountants.

The cause of this rapid population expansion has been our massive economic push. The alternative to all this is taming the tiger economy and trimming it down.

So, unless Alex Borg really has a clear solution to this problem, it would be best to put the matter on the back burner.

The numbers game

Surveys give a snapshot of voter sentiment at a given point in time. Several surveys, including MaltaToday’s, are showing some key trends that keep surfacing time and time again despite the difference in numbers. Three key pointers are: Fewer Labourites will vote in the next general election; more former PN voters are now rallying back to the party after opting not to vote; and the number of non-voters will increase or remain the same as four years ago.

One thing that superseded the current electoral cycle is the fact that the 60,000 or so voters who form the ‘party of non-voters’ are here to stay. This trend has been developing over several election cycles.

Nonetheless, as things stand today, the writing on the wall still points to a Labour victory in the next election but not the extent that some people blinded by political allegiance believe.

Whether this prognosis will still be valid by election time still has to be seen.