Kluivert Galea writes a long piece (July 24) in response to one point I made earlier about the often-claimed wage injustices in British colonial times, my article having listed a number of historical facts that do not add up to the terrible image of life in Malta as depicted by detractors of this period and whom Galea considers are its “reputable” raconteurs.
Of course, Galea needs to be congratulated for researching our HM dockyard work conditions, but these need to be put into the context of the times. I indicated that the colonial service tended to increase the salaries of those working away from home. Galea got it wrong when I quoted Maltese doctors working in the colonial service would have been similarly favourably treated; he seems to have erroneously equated the UK health service with colonial service.
Along with level-headed commentators, I have never said the British were here because they fell in love with Maltese eyes; they were here because it suited their global ambitions. But a fair academic exercise would be expected to compare and contrast life in British Malta with other colonising experiences of the same period and of other times.
Fairness would also require discussion whether the alternative to colonisation, at that time, could have proven a better or worse experience for our people.
Galea’s long article doesn’t have even one little positive feature of the period in question, but my generation has some advantage over his because we have memory of its last decades, and we remember a few positive ones. Free primary and secondary education were established in British times, and the calibre of our pre-war Lyceum was almost certainly not exceeded anywhere in southern Europe.
My father, educated at the Lyceum, was sent by the colonial administration, from the bottom of Cospicua, to pursue his pre-war teacher’s training at London University.
My three uncles worked at HM dockyard and Royal Navy, and their salaries maintained middle class standard homes and families. My recollection of their standard of living, and overall contentment with their career was not negative, as Galea appears to have gathered from his research. I would venture to say that, considering wives then didn’t work outside the home for a second income, the middle classes may have been better off with life in general than they are today.
Another positive of HM dockyard Galea chose to omit was the Dockyard School, which one may regard as the progenitor of our present very successful MCAST skills college. I know at least two retired gentlemen whose successful careers started at our Dockyard School, which formally ran skills courses culminating in a City & Guilds certificate one could use for job applications throughout the Commonwealth.
Another negative that Galea highlights is the claim that British Malta was left economically underdeveloped and that practically the only available employment was with the colonial administration or the admiralty. True enough – what did one expect in a military and naval fortress? But, as I’ve already pointed out, Sicilians and southern Italians flocked here in search of work and a better life.
I repeat that credible research conclusions, both in the sciences and the arts, need a foundation of balanced judgement based on comparing and contrasting with relevant benchmarks. So, if we compare life for the common man in Malta between 1530 and 1800 and between 1800 and 1964, what do we find?
Free primary and secondary education were established in British times- Albert Cilia-Vincenti
Before the arrival of the Knights of St John, apart from a few rich families of Sicilian or Spanish origin in Mdina, the sparse population of around 10,000 lived in abject poverty, some in caves. I have a feeling we have little information about the living conditions of the plebs between 1530 and 1798; the main employment would have been working for the Knights and for this efficiently run Mediterranean piracy and slavery centre, organised almost on the lines of a stock exchange.
Between 1798 and 1800, thousands of Maltese are said to have died resisting a foreign occupation and, strangely enough, we have no public holiday commemorating the end of this occupation, although we do have public holidays for Sette Giugno, Freedom Day and Republic Day.
Galea touches on unionisation at the dockyard – in principle this is a good thing for workers, but if the union only organises strikes when one particular party is in office and contributes to huge annual financial losses for the dockyard and the taxpayer, then the path was set for the dockyard to be closed and privatised.
Galea dispenses of “jobs provided in the British period” as nothing but an “opportunity to be grateful to be able to taste the master’s boot on your neck”. Now this really sounds like a copy of 1950s ‘Mintoffian’ rhetoric.
For Galea’s information, Mintoff’s administration legalised (Social Security Act item 54b) the defrauding of pensioners who had a civil or military service pension (set up by the colonial administration), and all subsequent post-colonial Maltese administrations have let this injustice continue.
If that wasn’t enough insult to workers of post-colonial Malta, the last Nationalist administration not only re-introduced a civil service pension for the judiciary, but also legislated (Social Security Act item 64C) for future holders of civil service pensions (from Malta or EU institutions) to be exempt from Social Security Act item 54b. So, for Galea’s information, the Republic of Malta does fiscally discriminate and makes some of its citizens “taste its boot on their necks”.
Furthermore, post-colonial Malta, always politically polarised, allegedly has a strong history of political nepotism in public service jobs and promotions, and in allocation of tenders. If this is truly the case, we’ve become less of a parliamentary democracy and more of an autocracy. Perhaps Galea should now go for a PhD thesis investigating Malta’s post-colonial political hypocrisy.
Albert Cilia-Vincenti is President of the National Association of Service Pensioners.