If An Election Is Held Tomorrow, Labour Could Be Able To Change The Constitution By Itself
Public support for the Labour Party has reached such gargantuan levels that an election could return it to power with such a large majority that it will be able to change the Constitution unilaterally without needing to consult the Opposition.
By Maltese law, constitutional changes require the support of two-thirds of MPs to pass, which until now has always meant an agreement between the government and the Opposition.
However, a survey published by MaltaToday indicates 63% of the public intend to vote Labour in the next election, which would see it return to power with a massive 90,000 vote majority. In contrast, only 33% of the Maltese public intend to vote PN, while 4% intend to vote for either the Partit Demokratiku or Alternattiva Demokratika.
These results are based solely on the 78.3% of survey respondents who declared their voting intentions. If Labour manages to win the trust of the majority of the remaining 21.7% of voters who said they are unsure who to vote for or who currently intend to waste their vote, the party could well win the next election by a whopping 67% – which would empower it to change the Constitution without consulting the PN.
The survey will provide yet another boost to Prime Minister Joseph Muscat, a week after It-Torċa forecast a PL victory of 60,000 votes and a week before the five-year anniversary of his 2013 election victory. It will also send shivers down the spine of Opposition leader Adrian Delia, who has failed to make significant inroads six months after he was elected PN leader.
Worryingly for Delia, only 61.9% who voted for the PN in last year’s election intend to vote for it again – with 13.4% planning to switch to PL, 10.3% planning to throw away their vote, 2.6% planning to switch to a small party, and 11.7% still unsure.
Essentially, this means that more than one in 10 people who had voted for Simon Busuttil last year would rather vote for Joseph Muscat than for Adrian Delia.
Contrarily, 86.7% of Labour voters intend to stick with the party, with only 2.1% switching to PN and 1.5% switching to PD or AD.
MaltaToday’s latest trust barometer also delivers more good news for Muscat, with 52.7% of respondents saying they trust the Prime Minister more than the Opposition leader – a massive 12 point increase from the paper’s survey last month. Delia’s trust increased by five points to 20.2% in this same period, but it is still less than half that of the Prime Minister.
While 91.2% of PL voters trust Muscat more than they trust Delia, only 66.3% of PN voters trust Delia more than they trust Muscat and 8.9% of voters actually trust the Prime Minister more than the Opposition leader.
With the MEP and local council elections coming up in 14 months’ time, Delia’s first electoral test is fast approaching. Could it already be too late for him though?
Can Adrian Delia turn the numbers around in his favour?
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