What will life in Malta look like in 2021 after the end of this corona pandemic?

According to our prime minister, we will soon be going back to the construction- and mass- tourism-led economic growth and its natural corollary, demographic, ecological and aesthetic destruction of Malta.

However we all know that ‘l-uomo propone e Dio dispone’.  What the world will look like may not allow a simple resumption of our former lives as though nothing had happened.

I doubt mass tourism will simply resume next year. Many will never set foot on a cruise liner again. These have proven to be breeding grounds of disease in restricted areas where crew and passengers cannot avoid infecting each other.

Nobody will take a trip by air  in a confined space with 180 other passengers coming from countries where the virus would still be in early stages or in renewed outbreaks unless absolutely necessary.

No one will go on holiday to one of the most densely populated countries in the world where the chances of being infected are big.

Who would consider retiring or buying an expensive property in such a densely populated country? Construction activity with continual fatal accidents in the inner cores of towns because of demolition digging happening too close to older badly-built houses frightens investors. Will they invest in a country where the main hospital was built with defective and fraudulent mixes of concrete supplied by greedy local suppliers?

Who can guarantee the quality of concrete delivered to present buildings? Who would invest in a 27- or 36- floor building where lifts could always break down because of electricity cuts or where the fire brigade cannot reach these heights in case of fire? These facts cannot be hidden from investors.

No, Mr Prime Minister, the world after the pandemic, whenever this pandemic is overcome, will not be the same as before. The recipe of our former disgraced prime minister Joseph Muscat and his cronies will not work. Factories will turn to 3D printing, offices will close and turn to home office and distance digital services with people staying home. Language schools will also go digital and teach at distances.

I doubt mass tourism will simply resume next year. Many will never setfoot on a cruise liner again

Parents will not send their children on planes that are crowded, to countries that are crowded, to classes that are crowded to risk their children coming back with the virus to kill grandma or grandpa. Families who would have gone through eight or 10 months of severe austerity being unable to pay rent and just able to survive on government hand-outs, will be in greater debt than before. Rebuilding their economy once more will be prioritised over holidays or gambling, as sporting events are forbidden after the pandemic.

This scenario is highly probable and the entire world will only be free once a vaccine is discovered and all populations are inoculated.

In this new world Malta has a chance to grasp the opportunity that this calamity provides. All catastrophes offer opportunities for those who are capable of thinking and who are not caught in the net of lobbyists, of capitalists and business-as-usual blindness.

For Malta may I suggest going to a new economy that is based upon reduced but highly expensive tourism where we let a large number of two-, three- or four-star hotels be upgraded or close down. The five- and six-star resorts and hotels should be helped to raise the salary levels of their employees so that a lower number of employees will provide income for entire families and provide better qualified services to the luxury tourists.

All airbnb premises are to have five or six stars qualification marks which should include 24 hours concierge services, Maltese language skills and fire and emergency provisions.

We should ban cruise liners from entering our territorial waters since these only leave profits for the cruise companies and ship owners.

Reducing the number of non-regulated taxi services, of cheap souvenir shops and over supply of eateries and coffee shops will be a good thing as they clutter and make the island look cheap and shabby.

Tax holidays for retirees and for money launderers should be eliminated.

Construction must stop. It is uglifying our country and will deter luxury tourism and wealthy retirees from visiting our island. They will only come if we are unique. We should introduce obligatory electric cars, free or next to free electricity and public electric transportation. Investors read the same tea leaves I am reading. The speculators behind the planned high-rise buildings that have begun to be built or that are still in the planning or preconstruction phase can and should be stopped.

These speculators will get cold feet and if they stop and turn their sites to parks then Malta might still make it to be a luxury tourism destination.  The construction industry with proficient Maltese-speaking staff earning good salaries can turn to restoration of all buildings in Malta bringing these to energy neutral buildings in the beautiful two storey heights that characterise Maltese village cores. If this is not done freely then the government should set an obligatory moratorium.

If the present government does not turn a completely new page then post-pandemic life  may take a political meaning and be translated to post-Partit Laburista.

John Vassallo, former ambassador to the EU