Sparks fly at Enemalta - October 18, 2004

The Enemalta Professional Officers' Union said the corporation had again carried out restructuring without consulting it.

The union said that following the reassignment of duties and increase in the salary scale for non-professional grades over the last few years a call for application for the filling of a number of management posts had been circulated internally without it being involved in the exercise.

It also objected strongly about the fact that circulars for applications for management posts do not specify salary scales.

The union said it appeared that the corporation had intended to offer an IT-related managerial post to newly graduated professionals in an effort to persuade them to remain with Enemalta. If this was the case, the union said it would insist that similar calls for application were also issued in the engineering division.

The conditions of work and low salaries at Enemalta were persuading first-class newly graduated engineers who wish to follow a career in power engineering to seek posts within private industry, the union said, adding that motivation of engineers in the grades it covered was at an all-time low.

The union said Enemalta had opted to substitute recruitment of new engineering graduates by compulsory overtime which, it added, was paid at the same rates as technical officers. This situation demonstrated the low esteem in which the corporation held its engineers, the union added.