If that’s the case, then the prime minister and Mrs Muscat should lead by example
The prime minister was reported as saying in Fgura yesterday:
The traditional society of the husband providing for his family and the stay-at-home wife is over. We have a new socio-economic reality which this country is not adequately prepared for.
The prime minister and his wife should lead by example. Here we have a man with a stay-at-home wife, who is the sole provider in his family, preaching at others that the traditional society of the husband providing for his family and the stay-at-home wife is over.
If you are going to say those things, you should make sure that before you do, you are not in that position yourself. Otherwise, what you are saying, effectively, is that other men’s wives should get a job but your wife is more privileged and needn’t.
As it happens, I agree with the prime minister’s view, but then I am in a position to say so. I don’t say that women should work while refusing to do so myself.
Our prime minister tends to admire British prime ministers. Well, to take the last three: Tony Blair’s and Gordon Brown’s wives both had busy careers which they kept up even while their husband was prime minister. And Mrs Cameron is creative director of Smythson of Bond Street.
It is easier, not more difficult, for a prime minister’s wife to work because she has all the household help and nanny support she needs, plus a chauffeur-driven car and a personal assistant.
A political job in the Office of the Prime Minister does not count. It does not convey the required message of independence and standing on your own two feet while contributing to the household and the economy, which is what this is all about – but rather the opposite.
The woman who works as a political aide for her husband is no different to the stay-at-home wife. Instead of cleaning up after him at home she is, in another form, cleaning up after him at the office. Mrs Muscat should have kept up with her career instead of turning her husband into her career, which is exactly what that husband is now telling us is the model of the past.
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I wish he would go one step further and be a stay-at-home husband.
If Mrs. Muscat is assisting her husband at the Auberge de Castille, doesn’t that mean that the couple have effectively moved house from Burmarrad to the Auberge, and that they are a stay-at-home couple? In fact in my view they should both get a real job and start doing something useful for the country.
Oh come on, Daphne, please. We all know that Konrad Mizzi’s wife not only works but works abroad and earns more than Minister Konrad himself.
What about MEP Marlene Mizzi? She’s an MEP, runs a business and her husband is a magistrate.
Silvio Schembri’s wife works also. She is a lawyer and the government has appointed her to the Police Board.
And even in Gozo, I hear that Anton Refalo’s wife works with him at his office.
Then we have JPO who works as a dentist, runs a Botox clinic, deals in land and is chairman of the Science Council while his wife ….ahem oh drop it!
Who would prepare salads for Joseph if Michelle starts working?
Joseph : Do as I say and not as I do.
Gonzi : Judge me with what I do and not with what I say.
Has not Joseph Muscat in effect transferred his matrimonial home to the Auberge de Castille?
Oh, that would be the day, when the prime minister gives up his job to stay at home.
She may be at home but she is getting a salary.
http://daphnecaruanagalizia.com/2013/03/michelle-muscatgov-mt/