Editorial

The Government’s promise of a solution in the coming weeks raises an uncomfortable question: what exactly has it been doing until now? Malta’s oriental hornet infestation is an indictment of a government that appears to have spent years reacting to…

There is something distinctly Maltese about having to debate whether a development that can remain in place for five years should be considered temporary. The Planning Authority’s proposed framework for outdoor sporting facilities, including obstacle courses, trail runs and endurance…

You do not need to be a civil engineer to understand that excavating above an underground cistern with heavy machinery could end badly. Yet in Tarxien, the ground gave way beneath an excavator, exposing a substantial, water-filled cavity beside the…

Malta’s tax authorities are owed almost €1.2 billion by individuals and companies. Yet only €412.9 million is considered recoverable. These figures, brought to light through parliamentary questions by Nationalist MP Graham Bencini to Finance Minister Clyde Caruana, demand more than…

Malta does not merely have an education problem. It has a thinking problem. And sooner or later, the two become everybody’s problem. Scroll through Facebook on any given day and the symptoms are difficult to miss. Confident assertions presented as…

Malta’s planning appeals system has long suffered from an absurdity: a permit can be challenged in law while the building it authorises continues to rise. By the time the challenge succeeds, the damage may already be done. The government is…

Alex Borg is willing to sign a memorandum committing the government and Opposition to a long-term mass-transport project. Politically, it is an easy offer for the PN to make. It loses little by agreeing to continuity across electoral cycles. The…

A criminal trial depends on a simple promise: the accused will be judged on the evidence, by people capable of considering it impartially. In the trial of Yorgen Fenech, that promise has become the subject of deeply troubling questions —…

There is a revealing contradiction in Malta’s political landscape. Labour and the Nationalist Party are virtually neck and neck in voting intentions, yet among voters aged over 65, Labour retains a lead. Among those aged 51 to 65, the balance…

Artificial intelligence has just given us another reason to reconsider how much autonomy we are prepared to hand over to machines. Not because a computer has developed a murderous instinct, as the more excitable headlines might suggest, but because an…

The administration of justice depends on more than the absence of actual bias. It also depends on public confidence that cases are heard by judges and magistrates whose impartiality cannot reasonably be questioned. A recent Constitutional Court ruling concerning an…

Robert Abela now has a beer named after him. Given Labour’s talent for turning public life into a branding exercise, the only surprise is that it took this long. Bobby’s new Lager: brewed at Ta’ Qali, bottled with confidence, and…