Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1091272
OPINION 27 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 10 MARCH 2019 Checks and balances Evarist Bartolo Evarist Bartolo is Minister for Education and Employment Michael Briguglio Michael Briguglio is a PN candidate for the European Elections REAL people in real Malta: Persons with specific life stories, experiences, needs and opportunities. Persons living unique everyday lives and who share commonalities and differences with others. Some are not experienc- ing the best of times. For example, the sickly man who is almost fifty years old and who lives with a sickly mother in her mid-seven- ties. She had to sell everything to bury her husband and they are now facing eviction whilst waiting for social hous- ing together with many others in the waiting list. The single mother who takes care of her children and her wheelchair- bound mother. They live in sub-stand- ard property which is unaffordable and which they will soon have to move out from. The single working woman who lives in social housing built a few years ago. Only that its walls are full of mould due to water that seeps in. The elderly couple who dread the ar- rival of utility bills. The husband's only hobby is to meet his elderly friends in his workshop. Will he have to relin- quish this to afford utility bills? The man who lives close to illegal development which has been facing enforcement notices since 1997. In the meantime, cement is being manu- factured in an agricultural area. Dust and noise galore. In the same village, other illegalities persist as the authori- ties rely on bureaucratic excuses to do nothing. The architect who refused to certify bad workmanship, got transferred and had to quit the public sector as work conditions became unbearable. The young man who lives with his parents as he cannot afford to rent or purchase property, despite being a middle-income earner reading for a Doctorate. The elderly woman with three slip- discs who urgently requires a carer. And the myriad of elderly persons who are lonely amid the urban townscape. The activists and scholars whose pro- posals were ignored or used as photo opportunities. The Labour-leaning worker at Wasteserv who is shocked at the mismanagement and poor practices at Magħtab. The separated mother of three in her fifties who manages to earn 1,200 Euro a month but whose rent bill reads 850 Euro a month. The woman with disability who is given a weekly allowance of just 20 Euro and 38 cents. 38 cents more than what she was given a year before. The civil servant who cannot speak up due to fear of repercussions. This is a small sample of the peo- ple I recently encountered. Politics, sociology and activism enabled me to encounter many people in the past twenty-five years. Sometimes you can follow up and as- sist, at other times you feel powerless and can only empathise. Such people deserve dignity. They deserve to be listened. The forgotten woman and man deserve empathy and action, and not preaching from the high chair. On-the-ground politics actively encounters people to actively seek the myriad realities of today. For without real knowledge of one's society, it is difficult to devise politics with a social dimension. Real people in real Malta RECENT reports by the International Monetary Fund present a statement of affairs of how the Maltese economy is performing and discuss the struc- tural improvements that we have seen over the past five years. In the last Malta country report, the IMF notes the "prudent fiscal policy and success- ful structural reforms" that have made the Maltese economy "one of the fast- est growing countries in the EU after the crisis". The report takes a sober and apoliti- cal look at the Maltese economy from a technical perspective and it lists the successes, such as an increase in productivity and growth, and the challenges these successes bring with them, such as new infrastructure and housing needs. Another report, published over the past days and one that was requested by the Maltese Government, is the Financial System Stability Assess- ment. Overall, it presents a positive bill of health of the financial sector, especially the banking system, which the IMF says is well-capitalised, liquid and whose profitability is healthy. Non-performing loans (loans which are defaulting) is a commonly-used indicator of the financial system and the economy, and the IMF notes that the Maltese index of this indicator is below the euro area. The IMF also lists a number of recommendations that are needed to improve the sector – mainly focusing on more resources for supervisory improvement, anti-money laundering measures and regulatory strengthen- ing. One has to understand the context of these recommendations – every financial system has shortcomings that needs to be addressed. If you look at the same type of report, by the same authority (IMF), for a financial giant like Germany it breaches similar themes. The IMF had noted that Germany needed to 'improve the effective- ness of the anti-money laundering and countering financial terrorism supervisory framework over cross- border banks, implement measures to strengthen the oversight role of the banks' supervisory board and other similar concerns on banking regula- tions and oversight. This shows that some of the chal- lenges are common and not specific to one country, as sometimes some try to give the impression, and that issues with the financial sector are usually systematic on a continental and global platform, and not limited to one country. You may ask – why does all this matter and how does this affect me? The stability of the financial stabil- ity is a little bit like the stability of the ground underneath your feet. You don't really notice until it starts to wobble. Having a sound financial structure means families can be in a position to get a house loan, busi- ness can loan money for expanding their commerce and there is a smooth financial system in place for the economy to grow. The financial stability of a country is very important for investment and together with the political and eco- nomical considerations, is one of the most important factors for an inves- tor. This, in essence, means better jobs and work opportunities for our society. The well-being of the financial sec- tor is important because it is the well- being of the country. Our projects in education, health, infrastructure and the rest all depend on the ability of the economy to perform and to create the wealth for the Government to invest for the general public. It is all a chain and while people sometimes are put off by the technical jargon of economical reports, they are very important indicators on the path that our country is taking. Success breeds a new set of challeng- es, but they are challenges that with a can-do attitude they can be overcome. In other EU countries, challenges involve the creation of jobs and hav- ing minuscule economic growths. In Malta, the challenge is how to handle the overflow of jobs and the high growth rate. Through well-planned policies these are challenges that can be analysed and dealt with to make sure that the prosperity we are seeing in our economy flows back to all sec- tors of society.