In terms of Parliament, Debono proposed a reform of Malta’s electoral system to slash the number of electoral districts from 13 to seven. He said each district should elect 7 MPs, for a total of 49 MPs, down from the current 79, which means Malta has the largest Parliament per capita in Europe.

Moreover, he said the 49 MPs should all be full-timers.

He said this system will serve to clamp down on clientelism, the infamous feature of Maltese politics whereby political candidates promise unfair favours to constituents in return for their vote.

“If there are seven districts, it means the districts will grow in size, and larger districts with seven MPs will result in less clientelism,” he argued.

However, Debono said Malta shouldn’t have fewer local councils as the current system recognises the unique characteristics of different Maltese villages. Instead, he urged the government to decentralise power and ensure local councils aren’t reduced to mere customer care centres with the main function of councillors being to forward residents’ complaints to the relevant authorities.

“I think that, by and large, local councils have proved to be a successful experiment and I think it should be enhanced,” he said.

Following the reshuffle, Debono delved deeper into the politics behind the Cabinet. He said that while he believes the Cabinet is too large for Malta, the reshuffle shows Robert Abela is willing to constantly renew his party in a way the last PN government led by Lawrence Gonzi wasn’t.

“This reshuffle gives his MPs a chance to contribute to the country’s leadership, in sharp contrast to when Lawrence Gonzi led with an apartheid-style of politics that excluded his own MPs to the point where it broke the party so severely that it has yet to recover ten years later,” he said.

“In Gonzi’s time, rather than MPs being allowed to work, they were insulted for wanting to become ministers. Look at where the party is ten years down the line.

Debono, who has publicly said he wants to return to the PN, urged the party to learn some lessons in reconciliation from the PL.

He noted that Abela has been Prime Minister for four years, even though his father George Abela had criticised the PL’s wrongdoings and found himself frozen out of the party for years as a result.

He also noted that current judge Toni Abela had actually quit the PL in the 1980s to help set up Alternattiva Demokratika, from where he was heavily critical of the PL government.

“However, he returned to the party and – in one of the greatest wonders in Maltese politics – became their deputy leader, and this after 15 years frozen in the wilderness,” Debono said.

“Can the PN forget its past differences, look forward and reconcile with people who were sidelined because they were right? Can it open its doors wide to allow them to contribute to the party?”

“A friend of mine told me that the PN had fought with so many people when it was in government that all the PL government’s froġi and pudini weren’t enough to heal the wounds and bring people back. People with open wounds caused by the PN prefer the PL’s pudini than the PN’s wounds.”

“He told me that the PN should focus on healing these wounds, and unless it does that, it won’t recover.”

Do you agree with Franco Debono’s proposal?