Editorial

Its an old 'Maltese' joke: an army recruit, after having finished the task at hand, was told by his sergeant-major: "You may leave". Promptly, the recruit left, but did not report back to duty until three days later. When the RSM wanted to know why the man had simply disappeared for two whole days, the recruit replied: "Mhux int ghidtli niehu jumejn leave?" (Didn't you tell me I could take two days' leave?)

Although merely a play on words, the joke perhaps typifies the average Maltese worker's propensity to take leave at every opportunity, even French leave if necessary...

It also partly explains why the General Workers Union is threatening "trouble" if Government carries out the measure announced in the Budget to eliminate days off in lieu of public holidays which fall on non-working days, i.e. Saturday and Sunday. There are four such holidays next year, and two the following year. There are a total of 14 public holidays, between religious and national feasts.

We have actually been through this before. Dom Mintoff's Labour government in 1978 had unilaterally decided (no MCESD existed then) to eliminate five public holidays (all religious feasts, it so happened, September 21, Independence Day, having been removed in 1971), in order to raise productivity. The Church had acquiesced, insisting only on retaining February 10, the feast of St Paul Shipwrecked, as a holiday of obligation (to hear Mass).

The General Workers Union's acquiescence then was total: there were no threats of "trouble". It was only the Nationalist Party, then in Opposition, which promised to restore the public holidays if returned to office. In fact, after gerrymandering prevented it from taking office in December, 1981, despite having obtained the absolute majority of votes, the PN had directed its supporters not to report for work on June 29, 1982, one of the public holidays which Labour had suppressed. The thousands of PN sympathisers who followed that directive and who were in public employment paid bitterly for their decision. Needless to say, there was no sympathy for them from the GWU - quite the contrary, in fact.

The public holidays were eventually restored when the Nationalists were returned to power in May, 1987. Not only, but it soon became the practice to claim another day off if any of those public holidays fell on a Saturday or a Sunday. This practice was sanctioned in many collective agreements.

And this is why the government is now saying it will override any such references to days off in lieu by amending the employment regulations.

To an objective observer, this logical measure is long overdue and certainly does not warrant any "battles" waged by the GWU or others. After all, it is not as if the average Maltese employee is deprived of free time. A five-day week already means that out of 365 days in a year, 104 are non-working days. Add to these 14 public holidays and an average 24 days' annual leave, and you already have 142 non-working days. And in summer, of course, most people in the public sector, and a good number of those in the private sector, enjoy half-days when the main reason for this - the heat - has now largely been overcome through the widespread use of airconditioning.

Then, of course, there is the question of sick leave, which is still widely abused. Some people think that the fact that they are entitled to 28 days' sick leave with pay means that they must, by hook or by crook, manage to take all 28! This clear abuse even led some employers to propose giving incentives to employees who do not take sick leave!

Again, the Mintoff government tried to control this abuse by not giving sickness benefit for the first three days - a measure retained by the Nationalists. However, rampant abuse of sick leave still represents a considerable drain on employers in terms of wages and lost productivity.

And despite more frequent checks by company doctors, sick leave continues to be abused - whether in the hunting season, or for the village festa, or for family reasons.

When it comes to comparisons with the rest of the European Union member states, between generous leave, public holidays and paid sick leave, Maltese employees probably come out tops. And yet the continent is facing much tougher competition from low-cost, high-productivity countries like China and India. And Malta also faces competition from within the EU itself, notably from the new East European member states.

Is it beyond the GWU leaders' ability to figure out that with higher productivity (admittedly not exclusively brought about through fewer holidays) it is the workers themselves who will ultimately benefit, not to mention the country as a whole? May the new year, now on our doorstep, also usher in a new way of thinking.