Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1505128
THERE are a couple of things that have always puzzled me about the Nationalist Party. Such as, for instance, the way its leader, Bernard Grech, candid- ly admitted (in April last year) that the PN's debt now stands at a staggering €32 million... ... and yet, the same Bernard Grech somehow seems perfect- ly capable of predicting future price fluctuations: even in no- toriously 'unpredictable' inter- national markets, such as the European energy sector. Consider, for instance, how Grech has so far defended his party's proposal to 'liberalise' Malta's energy distribution network: by insisting that... 'this will not lead to an increase in energy prices'. At a glance, this already raises quite a few additional questions (including the most obvious of the lot – i.e., how the heck does Bernard Grech actually KNOW that, for a fact?) But I'll come back to that a little later on. For now, I'm quite willing to go along with the idea that var- ious exponents of the National- ist Party – including its leader; and also its finance spokesman, Mark Anthony Sammut – pos- sess some kind of miraculous, innate ability to accurately foretell whether the price of any given service or commodi- ty (energy, in this instance) will 'go up, or down', in the coming months, years, and decades. Sorry to have to ask, but: if this is indeed the case... then how on earth did the National- ist Party even manage to accrue a debt of €32 million, in the first place? And why is it still finding that debt so difficult to pay back, all the way down to this day? Let's face it, folks: if Bernard Grech really IS armed with such valuable foreknowledge, of how international markets are expected to perform in fu- ture – and the energy market no less: which has arguably never seen a more 'uncertain future', than the one it faces today – not only would the PN be easily capable of reversing its current economic fortunes (by means of just a couple of shrewdly-placed investments, in sectors that Grech 'knows for a fact' will be profitable...) ... but Bernard Grech himself would probably be numbered among the most obscenely wealthy individuals, to have ev- er walked Planet Earth: along- side Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and Bill Gates. As such, a debt of €32 million would be 'chicken-feed'... to someone who could probably afford to set up his own private Space Programme, and com- pete with Bezos for the 'coloni- sation of Mars'... But oh, well. It is rather evi- dent, from circumstances that are staring us all in the face, that neither the PN, nor Ber- nard Grech himself, has access to that kind of money, right now. (Still less, enough to pip the likes of Musk, Bezos and Gates, to the top of 'Forbes 500' list). So – no offence, or anything – I've decided to no longer ac- cept the notion that Bernard Grech is indeed blessed with some kind of magical 'econom- ic clairvoyance'. Clearly, he possesses no such powers, at all... and quite frankly, this also shows up from his own – and his party's – arguments on the subject of 'liberalisation'. Which brings us right back to that other question I asked earlier: how can Bernard Grech be so absolutely certain, that 'liberalisation will not lead to higher prices'? Let's see now. So far, the PN only seems to have come up with two arguments, to support the above claim. The first (chronological- ly-speaking) was provided by Bernard Grech himself: when he pointed towards "past suc- cessful liberalisation efforts, such as the PN's decision to open up the telecommunica- tions market, which, according to him, led to reduced prices and job stability." The second came from Mark Anthony Sammut, who – in a televised debate with Energy Minister Miriam Dalli – mere- ly repeated the traditional 'pro-liberalisation' argument, that "this would give consum- ers more choice" (with the un- derlying implication that 'more choice' = 'more competition' = 'more pressure on private com- panies to LOWER (not raise) their prices', etc. etc.) Once again, I apologise for being such a spoilsport, but... both those arguments – and bear in mind that the PN hasn't actually come up with any oth- ers, since – are, for want of a better word... BULLSHIT, from beginning to end. Let's start with Grech's ap- parent belief – inherent in his description of 'telecommuni- cations liberalisation' as a 'suc- cess' – that people are some- how paying LESS for services in this sector, today... than they used to pay in the days before the sector was liberalised, way back in the 1990s. Now: to be fair, there is some room to argue (even if Grech didn't actually make this argu- ment, in as many words) that certain costs associated with this service have undeniably been reduced, since liberalisa- tion. These include the simple price of an overseas call: which – even accounting for three decades worth of inflation, in the meantime – is probably around 10 times cheaper, to- day, than it ever was in the past. Two small snags, though. One: the reasons for this re- duction in price have less to do with 'competition/free choice', etc... than with the rapid stride of technological progress, in the field of telecommunica- tions itself. Two: the same technological innovations that have arisen, since the 1990s – including mobile telephony, text-mes- saging systems, 'WhatsApp' and God-know-else – have also come complete with an entire raft of new expenses, that quite frankly never even existed, back in the days before 'liber- alisation'. 10 OPINION 'Liberalisation leads to lower prices'. Really? Since when? Raphael Vassallo maltatoday | SUNDAY • 6 AUGUST 2023