Opting out of embarrassment

To any clear-minded, level-headed human being, the efforts of the Socialist Group in the European Parliament (PES) to phase out over three years a provision under which governments of EU member states can allow employees to work for more than the maximum 48-hour working week limit, means that such a provision (known popularly as the opt-out clause) does indeed exist in the EU's Working Time Directive.

Yet the Labour Party's propaganda machine has now attempted to spin these efforts as proof that when the Nationalist Party leadership reiterated the existence of this opt-out provision during the 2003 EU referendum campaign, they were saying a pack of lies while the MLP, that was denying its existence, was saying the truth.

The official interpretation of the opt-out clause as explained at the time by Government and the MIC (the Malta Information Centre) was even challenged in a judicial letter filed in court by then MLP deputy leader Joe Brincat. If Dr Brincat's interpretation was correct, then it follows that the present efforts of the PES in the European Parliament are completely unnecessary. But logic was never the MLP's forte!

The most recent electronic newsletter of the PES hails the vote in favour of the phasing out of the opt-out clause - taken over two years after Dr Brincat's scrupulous interpretation of the directive said it doesn't exist - as a 'socialist victory'. In Malta, of course, it is only an embarrassment for the socialists.

An embarrassment in more ways than one.

An embarrassment because of the way it proved that they had been economical with the truth about this issue during the referendum campaign and because of the way they are now trying to cover this up - saying lies today to hide yesterday's lies!

It is also an embarrassment because the vote in Brussels on the Socialist proposal has also brought to light the way the three Labour MEPs ended up voting differently and so complicating further the MLP's stand on the issue. One Labour MEP voted against; another abstained but immediately explained that he had pushed the wrong button; while the other consciously abstained on the more crucial clause of the proposal.

The Nationalist MEPs claim that there was an agreement that all five Maltese MEPs were to vote against the proposal to phase out the opt-out clause, but this is denied by at least one Labour MEP. What the MLP propaganda machine would have made of a similar situation with MEPs elected in the name of the PN sending this type of messy mixed signal, can well be imagined!

The MLP is, of course, out of tune with the PES on this issue. For the PES, their stand on the opt-out clause shows that they are "the parliamentary group fighting the hardest and most successfully for workers' rights in the EU", as they claim in their newsletter. For them, "the need for a balance between work, life and family, together with the need for quality jobs, by definition means jobs with regulated working hours."

In the past, I have already had the opportunity to criticise the obsession of the European Socialists with 'social engineering'. In this the Socialists are usually abetted by the European Greens.

There is no doubt that there should be a balance between work, life and family but, like many others, I believe that any decision on the nature of this balance belongs to the individual who does not need a 'nanny state' to 'take care' of him and 'protect' him by regulating how many hours of overtime he should work!

Strangely enough, no limit on part-time work as a second job is imposed when this also impinges on the balance between work, life and family. Who knows; maybe one fine day the Socialists will also attempt to continue to increase the level of state interference in personal matters by trying to impose provisions that limit part-time work as well. Their obsession with altering society through the imposition of rules and regulations in order to make it fit their 'ideal' knows no bounds.

In Malta, the phasing out of the opt-out clause is only seen as a move that would limit the take-home pay of many employees. It is all about something that could hinder the citizen's pursuit of money and few dared discuss the issue from the ideological point of view. Perhaps the pursuit of money is the ultimate ideology that has been tacitly adopted by all of us, whether red, blue, or green! How can one otherwise explain how in a country where everybody disagrees on everything all the time, there is a near-unanimous agreement in favour of the opt-out clause?

The GWU position on this issue is even more interesting. While purportedly it is all for the retention of the opt-out clause, its representative on the EU's Economic and Social Committee (ECOSOC) voted in favour of the idea that the decision on whether to limit overtime and by how much, was to be taken by the unions and not by the individual! When this was reported in the local press, the GWU deputy general secretary reacted by insisting that the GWU was all out for the opt-out clause while explaining that a decision taken by the workers' representatives (i.e. trade unions) is actually one taken by workers!

It seems that individuals do not exist in this socialist scenario... except when they are not GWU members, in which case the GWU deems it 'acceptable' to pick on them and discriminate against them by denying them overtime - as happened at Malta Drydocks for so many years!

Although they may be in favour of the opt-out clause for the wrong reasons, the antics of the MLP-GWU tandem on this issue have made it impossible for them to opt out of embarrassment.

micfal@maltanet.net