Malta's introduction of divorce “had to happen” and the Nationalist Party should have seen the shift in public mood coming, former Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi has admitted.
“I look back and I think I should have seen the sign of the times. Even my party should have seen the sign of the times more clearly. We did not and perhaps it’s one of the failures,” Dr Gonzi told former Scottish first minister Alex Salmond.
“But you know, the benefit of hindsight is a fairytale,” he added.
Dr Gonzi, who openly campaigned against the introduction of divorce and subsequently voted against a 2011 law introducing it said that, eight years on, Malta had adapted well.
“Has it been a positive experience for the island? On balance, yes,” he told Mr Salmond for his RT discussion programme.
“Divorce would have come to the island at some point in time. It had to happen. It happened in the way it did, our society had to adjust to it, our society has adjusted to it in a manner which is quite good.”
Dr Gonzi and many other PN MPs had come in for criticism in 2011 after they chose to vote against a divorce bill, despite a referendum for divorce delivering a majority in favour.
The issue had been forced onto the national agenda by a private member’s bill presented by one of Dr Gonzi’s own MPs, Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando and seconded by Labour MP (now minister) Evarist Bartolo.
Dr Pullicino Orlando was already on a collision course with his own party at that stage, and in his interview with Mr Salmond, Dr Gonzi hinted that party infighting may have played a part in the PN’s stance during the divorce debate.
“It was not on the government agenda and it was not on the other party’s agenda either. There was one MP who decided to bring it to the fore and this is what caused the big debate,” he said.
It is not the first time that Dr Gonzi, who quit politics after losing the 2013 general election to Joseph Muscat’s Labour, has reflected on the divorce debate with a hint of regret.
Just before that general election, he told an audience at a Times of Malta debate that the people had done the right thing in voting for divorce.