Of Christmas lists and short-term goals

After months and months of rumours, the prime minister finally took the bull by the horns this week and proclaimed that there would be a snap election later this month. The word snap is particularly fitting in this context because, ever since the announcement, it literally feels like I’m being assaulted by information from every single angle.

Contrary to what some have been writing on social media, I feel that the Labour Party was very clearly locked and loaded for this campaign. Within minutes of the announcement, the billboards were up and running and the expensive-looking adverts released. The party even went the extra mile, essentially ensuring that several of its more problematic members wouldn’t run for office. Despite what the polls are saying and have been saying for some time now, you have to appreciate that they have left nothing to chance. It’s early days yet; however, at least so far, it feels like they are more prepared than they have been in the past. What I definitely wasn’t prepared for, though, was the endless Christmas list that both parties are offering.

Like something out of a game show, a new offer is launched every few hours, and I honestly have to wonder where the money for all this is supposed to come from. It is no secret that the country’s coffers are bone dry and that national debt has ballooned by hundreds of millions compared to previous years. What, exactly, is the long-term plan?

And in that last question lies the crux of my issue with the volley of proposals that has come my way from both sides of the house: after the glittery, glitzy handouts and cash prizes for simply achieving the milestones that most people manage to limp to, what’s going to happen next?

You want to give me money for having a child but we are already severely overpopulated and need to work multiple jobs, as many of us can no longer afford home loans. You now want to give me an interest-free home loan, only I wouldn’t need that either if you helped control the housing market and actually said no to developers once in a blue moon. You want to give Gozo Channel foot passengers free passage but you’re not addressing the fact that Gozo’s infrastructure is starting to heave under the number of people visiting it daily.

The list goes on and on but most of these vote-grab promises have one thing in common: they only address the short term and largely sidestep the deeper structural issues the country is grappling with. I don’t know who needs to hear this but it’s going to take more than colourful plasters to fix the festering wounds.

It has also not escaped my attention that, as usual, the single or childless who aren’t of pensionable age have been ignored, even though they’re the ones who end up effectively paying for other people’s incentives through growing tax disparity.

I want to take this opportunity to remind both parties that a society only grows great when old men plant trees in whose shade they will never sit. My vote will not be going to the man who gave me flowers that died after a week but to the party that shows that they’re willing to plant the trees that will shelter generations to come.