Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1465732
maltatoday | SUNDAY • 24 APRIL 2022 9 INTERVIEW not a 'new Simon'. I'm not a 'new Metsola'. I'm not a 'new anybody', in fact. I'm Eve. I'm perfectly comfortable being Eve. And I hope to show people out there, what 'being Eve' means. And I hope that they like it. In a nutshell, I am very much the type of person who 'calls a spade a spade'. This is, in fact, what all my activism was about, to begin with…. It's also why you got so much criticism for it, too. Leaving aside the 'sex-life' angle – and the death-threats, for that mat- ter – isn't some of what remains actually quite legitimate? On one hand, you complain about 'unfair' criticism directed at yourself. But let's face it: you sometimes hit out pretty hard, too… If, by 'hitting out hard', you mean like when I called out Cyrus Engerer [over the Labour MEP's former 'revenge-porn' conviction]… bear in mind that the question I was answering, in that interview, was to give an ex- ample of the difference between the Nationalist, and Labour par- ties. So I made a very simple dis- tinction between two MEPs: one is the President of the European Parliament… and the other is a convicted sex criminal. These are, after all, facts… Yes, but your interpretation suggests that the entire Labour Party should be tarred with the same brush, as any single one of its exponents. And that's a dangerous path for any Nation- alist Party MP to take. It's not as though the PN doesn't have skeletons in its own closet… Whatever flaws the Nationalist Party has had, in the past… you can't realistically compare it to Labour… Can't you? Another thing you said on that programme was that the PN has 'never had blood on its hands'. Are you so sure about that? Was there ever any proof that it did? What if I told you that, in 2002 – the year before you were born – the Nationalist govern- ment ordered the deportation of over 200 Eritrean asylum seekers: despite warnings by the UNHCR that they risked tor- ture and death? (And a number of them were, in fact, tortured and killed?) Obviously, as you yourself said… I was born in 2003. I can't realistically answer about anything that happened before then… But your own comment was about the entire history of the Nationalist Party. Not to be unkind, or anything: but how much do you actually know about that history, to make such sweeping statements about it? Look, I'm not trying to use my age as an excuse, or anything; but I what I meant was that… al- though I can't take responsibility for what happened before I was born: I do recognise it. But what I'm focused on now, is what's happening in my lifetime; how it could be made better; and how we are going to look to the fu- ture, instead of the past. Fair enough, that brings us neatly to the second part of that quote I started with: i.e., that Bernard Grech is 'under- estimating the importance of Climate Change', by entrusting it to someone so young and (no offence) inexperienced as yourself. Certainly, a lot of peo- ple out there – including many Nationalists – share that sen- timent. How would you justify your own appointment to those people? I certainly can't claim to be a Climate Change expert, natu- rally. But I was an activist before entering politics… and while most of it was environmentalist activism - and usually over local environmental issues, such as ODZ development, and so on - a lot of it did, in fact, focus on climate change. And it did instil a lot of passion in me, for the subject. At the risk of generalising: I'd say that, if young people do tend to feel slightly more 'passionate' about these things, it's also because we don't look forward only to the next five years… or until the next elec- tion… but to the next 40 years, and beyond. Because obvious- ly, we will be the ones who in- herit the consequences of our inaction, today. Now: when it comes to the question of whether I am tech- nically 'qualified' or not, for such an important role… my response is: we're a democracy, not a tech- nocracy. And I don't think that any MP, or minister, should be a 'walking encyclopaedia' about everything, everywhere. My duty, as an MP respon- sible for Climate Change is to represent the people; and to speak with all the stakehold- ers… NGOs; academics; basi- cally, everyone who has a deep understanding of the field, es- pecially in the local context. I'm not here to be an expert, myself. I'm here to listen to the experts; learn from them, and to deliver on what needs to be done. And that's what I'm ready to do. It is, however, a very specific challenge. There are interna- tional Climate Change targets to be met; and some of the most crucial sectors involved in reaching those targets – name- ly, Energy and Transport – do not even fall under your own shadow portfolio. How, then, do you envisage your role in 'delivering on what needs to be done'? A subject like climate change is obviously too multifaceted, to be viewed as a single 'bubble', all on its own. It affects everything: from energy, to transport, all the way down to the way we con- sume…. And for that reason: yes, of course, I am going to be col- laborating with my fellow shad- ow ministers; and with all MPs overseeing the various related portfolios… because, like the reality of the problem itself, it has to be tackled from different angles. But my first step still has to be meeting with all the relevant stakeholders – the NGOS, aca- demics, activists experts in the field… … you left out 'industrialists'; and 'corporate lobby-groups with massive vested inter- ests' (especially in the energy and automotive sectors), etc. etc. And besides: one other problem with Climate Change, is that – while it is very easy for Maltese politicians to talk about it – there is very little we can actually do, as a country, to address the global causes. Wouldn't you say, then, that it will take more than just 'being Eve', to make an impact? I see your point, but I don't necessarily agree that there is 'very little we can do'. We could, at least, do what is with- in our capabilities to do. Take the Climate Change targets, for instance: ours are actually the lowest, in all of Europe's. Why is it so impossible for us to ever reach them? I, for one, don't think it is all that mpossible. I think that, with the right policies in place – which is the whole point of meeting, and talking to the stakeholders – there is a lot we can do, and which we are still in time to do. And there are certainly things we could be doing, about envi- ronmental problems which – while related to Climate Change – need to be urgently addressed anyway. One of the most de- pressing statistics I ever read – and I wrote an article about this, when I was 14 – was that 500 people a year die in this coun- try, due to air pollution alone. In other words, due to negligence… This is not something we are powerless to do anything about. It is something that we can, af- ter all, regulate through better policies. And that, ultimately, is what I intend to do…