[ANALYSIS] A double dose of reason

In parliament Evarist Bartolo and Mario de Marco have stood up to be counted as voices of reason at a time marked by an escalation in the permanent war of attrition between the two parties, says JAMES DEBONO

Evarist Bartolo: the PL needs the contribution of people of his stature
Evarist Bartolo: the PL needs the contribution of people of his stature
Mario de Marco – forward-looking speech
Mario de Marco – forward-looking speech
Joseph Muscat: ratings drop (Photo: Ray Attard)
Joseph Muscat: ratings drop (Photo: Ray Attard)
Simon Busuttil – risks appearing too confrontational
Simon Busuttil – risks appearing too confrontational

They may have said nothing new, but it was the way they said it and when they said it which left a mark on those who followed their speeches.

In an increasingly surreal scenario marked by an escalation in political tension three and a half years before a general election, Evarist Bartolo and Mario de Marco went beyond partisan considerations in their contribution to the debate on party financing.

Neither Bartolo nor de Marco have parted ways with party orthodoxy, but both looked at ways of strengthening Maltese democracy rather than scoring partisan points. Both defended the role of political parties as a fundamental aspect of Maltese democracy, something which contrasts with the drift towards a presidential style of leadership which relegates political parties to the role of cheerleaders for strong leaders.

While back in July the Labour government had shunned the idea of state funding for political parties, rejecting an appeal by the Opposition to set a working group to draw up a report on state financing, Evarist Bartolo reiterated the basic left-wing principle that it is better to have parties funded by the state than by private interests. One may say that the only difference between Evarist Bartolo and his colleagues is one of emphasis, for government has not excluded introducing state funding at some date in the future. 

While the law itself bans state funding, Justice Minister Owen Bonnici argued in parliament that “political parties had to set their house in order so that taxpayers could be satisfied that any public funds which went to the parties were used well”. 

In fact, both Bonnici and Bartolo adopt a gradualist position, which contrasts with the PL’s more enthusiastic support for state funding in 2009. This on its own exposes another truth: that parties are keener on state financing when in Opposition, but lose their appetite for it when elected to government.

But while still a gradualist, Bartolo was the only MP on the government bench to present an ideological argument for state funding. He described political parties as a  “key to a strong democracy” and warned of the risks of having parties reliant on “big private donors”.

Bartolo argued that taxpayers would be more willing to fund parties with their taxes if these dispense of party owned TV stations. “Taxpayers do not want their money used to fund the political parties so that they could continue to insult each other” but may be more willing to fund “the drafting of modern policies.”

Bartolo’s speech is even more significant in view of the lack of any public debate in the Labour party on its long-term vision. It could serve as a wake up call for a party, which like the Nationalist party after 2004, has already entered a state of hibernation.

Small parties make us stronger

On the other side of the divide, it was de Marco who stood out in another forward-looking speech which not only went beyond purely partisan considerations but represented a sharp departure from the way his party traditionally ridiculed third parties like Alternattiva Demokratika.

De Marco criticised the debate on party financing  as one which gave the impression that “only Labour and PN existed in Malta as if the political landscape could never change… or that a change would not necessarily be good.”

De Marco said that even though Alternattiva Demokratika had failed to elect an MP ever since it was conceived, yet it still served important functions especially in its calls for transparency, accountability and its advocacy of environment protection.

Both politicians have managed to lift the level of debate by thinking beyond narrow partisan considerations.

Surely de Marco could have been more concrete in proposing splitting the present €200,000 a year meant to help parties in their research on EU matters with third parties which abide by a set of basic requirements. 

Like Bartolo, de Marco did not break ranks with his colleagues.

But even in his attack on Labour over its properties taken from private owners or sited on public land, de Marco was keener on presenting a moral and principled argument.

“The government has to accept that a Labour government in the past failed to distinguish between a government and the party and between the government and the state. There was blatant abuse of the requisition order and the present Labour administration must acknowledge this. If we are to have a level playing field, the Labour Party must return its 28 properties to the rightful owners.”

For while the PN’s call for a level playing field is legitimate in view of the advantages it inherits from the past, its demand for financial compensation to make up for this imbalance comes across to the electorate as an attempt to turn an injustice into a lucrative opportunity for the financially troubled PN.

De Marco, like his party, failed to refer to the clubs the PN owns in Ta’ Xbiex, Paola and Santa Lucija which are also located on public land. Perhaps the PN would be more credible by leading by example, either by renouncing to these properties or by paying a fair rent.

But de Marco’s attempt to rise above the fray by looking at issues overlooked in the partisan contest, comes at a moment when his party seems to be rushing in pouncing on the Labour government before completing the process of internal reforms. This may well be the case of starting to run before learning to walk.

The PN’s overdrive

Surely one understands the sense of urgency felt by a party which lost two consecutive elections by a wide margin, which is keen on exploiting the first cracks in the consensus enjoyed by government, but the trick for any opposition is to do this elegantly without sounding desperate. 

MaltaToday’s latest “rate the minister” surveys have exposed the first signs of difficulties for the government with prominent members of the Cabinet like Konrad Mizzi, Joe Mizzi, Manwel Mallia and Edward Scicluna losing points with the public.

Moreover the admission that the government will not be honouring a self-imposed deadline on completing the power station has damaged its credibility.

But while Muscat has seen his ratings as PM decline from 58% in April 2013 to 45% now, he still leads Simon Busuttil by 14 points.

The plain truth is that while people are quick to lose faith in individual ministers it takes time for people to change their allegiance and to renounce the trust they have invested in a newly elected Prime Minister.

Surely the Opposition has come back from the summer lull with a clear strategy to rock the boat, something which may be good for a healthy democracy if it translates into vigilant scrutiny of government and the presentation of policy alternatives. But it would backfire if it translates into a daily ritual of pouncing on a particular minister.

While Busuttil has left a positive impression through a landmark speech in his party’s convention, in the past weeks the party has gone into an overdrive of criticism, which is sometimes based on statistical half-truths which when exposed, tend to weaken all legitimate criticism. 

The PN has also to wake up to the reality that just as voters do not expect the PL to behave in the same way as the PN in government, they do not expect the PN to behave in the same way as the PL behaved in opposition. PN voters who detested Labour’s antics in Opposition may not feel comfortable with their party going down the same path.

For example, while it is true that the national debt has increased in 2013 by €370 million, it was during the first quarter, which included 64 days of PN administration that debt increased by €300 million over the previous year. And while there has been an increase in public sector employment, this also includes the former Arriva drivers, something the PN seems too willing to ignore.

A negative Opposition?

Contrary to the impression given by government, Simon Busuttil has sent some conciliatory messages over the past months, leading his party in a historical first vote for a President hailing from the opposing camp and voting in favour of most legislation presented in parliament, including that on party financing.

Yet while sending these messages Busuttil retains a hawkish posture and a partisan frame of mind which makes it very hard for him to reach out to the other side.  

This could be more a question of style than content. For example, he speaks of keeping President Marie Louise Coliero Preca ‘on probation’ rather than embracing her presidency and find common ground with her on issues like migration, where the President has defied xenophobic currents in her own party.

Moreover, while scrutiny of the Opposition is an essential part of democracy, by resorting to daily press conference pouncing on government rather than proposing alternatives, the PN risks an overkill rather than being selective and using its ammunition strategically.

The PN thus risks appearing too confrontational, giving credence to the government spin that the opposition is negative. The risk is that as happened on the citizenship issue, the Opposition’s intransigence may well serve to help Labour close ranks rather than boil in its own contradictions.

On the other hand one of the positive developments within the PN was the appointment of policy-making groups chaired by academics and experts not directly associated with the PN. Hopefully this will translate in some real debate within party structures.

As regards economics, the PN has only made two economic proposals which seem to contradict each other in spirit, a populist proposal for a tax cut to compensate for the low 58 cents wage increase and a more responsible proposal to introduce an obligatory  second pillar pension scheme.

This contrasts with Busuttil’s earlier attempt to defuse political tension by unilaterally putting an end to the “Sunday sermons”, which gave an indication that the party was intent on giving society a deserved break from partisan politics. 

Finding the right balance is proving to be an uphill task for Busuttil, especially in view of his choice of battlecry on nepotism, which may be too close to call for a party which dispensed patronage for 25 years.

One of the risks is that the party is simply tapping into the sentiment of its own core vote, which feels robbed by vulgar upstarts of their assumed natural right to govern. While some of Labour’s appointments like that of Sai Mizzi as a Malta Enterprise Envoy have crossed a line of common decency, middle of the road voters may recoil at seeing the pot calling the kettle black. 

Busuttil seems bent on carrying out party reform concurrently with increased antagonism against government. But while this strategy might be essential to galvanise the party’s grassroots into action, the increased dose of partisanship could be off-putting to the middle-of-the-road voters it wants to reach. 

Moreover with Muscat keen on retaining switchers by outdoing the PN in its appeal to the upper middle-class, discontentment is more likely to rise among traditional Labour voters, a category which remains alien to Busuttil. Neither does his party emphasise issues like precarious jobs and social policy.

Busuttil’s more restricted appeal to middle-class voters may be the reason why aping Muscat’s presidentialism may well not be the perfect recipe, and why the PN needs Busuttil to be flanked by the more populist Beppe Fenech Adami and the more liberal Mario de Marco.

Belittling Simon

Labour’s reaction to the Opposition’s attempt to rise up from the ashes is that of constantly belittling Simon Busuttil. In so doing Labour may be adopting a similar strategy to that of Mintoff with regard to Eddie Fenech Adami in the late 1970s and early 1980s when the PN leader was depicted as a toddler in Labour oriented newspapers. To some extent this tactic is also reminiscent of the dismissive way the PN’s propaganda machine treated Sant  before his surprise 1996 election victory.

Labour’s deliberate strategy of questioning Busuttil’s knowledge of economics and to depict him as an ignoramus exposes a streak of arrogance, which may be going too far.

But Labour’s greatest strategic error may well have been its deliberate strategy of absolving its own lack of transparency such as in its failure to publish the contract with Henley by turning the tables on the Nationalist party’s record in office. This strategy may damage the Opposition but it also damages the people’s faith in democratic institutions.  

So far the greatest strength of the government has been Muscat’s flexibility and his willingness to withdraw whenever he feels cornered as he did when he abandoned plans to postpone next year’s local elections to 2019 and when he succumbed to EU pressure to introduce a residency clause in the Individual Investor Programme.

Yet while on these issues Muscat was in full control, he may lack the same flexibility when dealing with strong private interests in the energy sector or with the new private public transport operators.

But the greatest risk for Labour is that it has become completely dependent on Muscat’s credibility. If this credibility is dented, the entire edifice will fall. The relegation of the party to a cheerleading role could ultimately weaken its hegemony in society. This is why the party needs the contribution of people of the same stature of Evarist Bartolo.

The PN may be aware of this and may be rushing to deal its blows in a moment of the PL’s present weakness. But in so doing it could be underestimating Muscat’s ability to turn the tables on it. Muscat must be wary of his standing among traditional Labour voters who might become increasingly uncomfortable with a PM who spends time selling citizenship in Singapore while basic services like public transport continue to deteriorate.

Moreover, will the Labour Party act as a counterweight to the technocratic and pro-business bias of a large part of Muscat’s Cabinet? The appeal by left-wing academics calling on Labour to come to terms with its own history as a party, whose raison d’etre is the emancipation of the working class, could not be timelier and deserves a response by the party.  One advantage for Muscat is that he faces little competition on his left flank, unless Alternattiva Demokratika reinvents itself to fill this vacuum.