Turning 87

Keith Grech, one of Malta's alternate members on the Committee of the Regions, blogs about the birth of the MLP 87 years ago:

It was on the 15th May 1921 that the Committee of the 'Camera del Lavoro' held its first General Meeting. The date was not chosen randomly. It marked, the thirtieth anniversary of Pope Leo XIII's Papal encyclical 'Rerum Novarum', which encyclical addressed the condition of the working classes, and which discussed the relationships and mutual obligations obtaining between capital and labour. The importance of this Papal encyclical to the working classes were obvious, for it supported the rights of labour to form unions, and contained one of the earliest proposals for a decent wage.

As every birth is preceded by conception and a period of gestation, so too was the formal setting up of the Party preceded by a preliminary preparatory phase. In fact, the first steps towards the setting up of the Party were taken by 12 founding members employed in the 'Workers' Union Branch Nr. 3' who, on the 15th October 1920, contractually agreed to bind themselves, by means of a contract in the acts of Notary P. Carbonaro, to fork out £25 each (a fortune at the time) and to use these funds for the setting up of the 'Camera del Lavoro'. The first President of the Party was Dr. P.G. Frendo and the first General Secretary was Mr. G. Bencini.

By the time that the 1921 'self-government' constitution had been granted, they had set up a political organisation whose aim was that of striving to advance the workers' cause. The Party contested the 1921 elections presenting a political program 'Pro Aris et Focis' based on the calls for greater democracy, honesty, and justice. In the Parliamentary elections, the Party garnered some 31% of the popular vote electing 7 deputies, whereas in the Senate it elected 2 Senators with 21% of the vote, (another 2 were elected to represent the working classes from the Trade Union Council, thereby increasing its tally of Senators to 4) and this at a time when the majority of workers were still disenfranchised...