Sant suggests trade unions should extend their role to consumer protection

The country needs to find a way to give a voice to consumers, Opposition leader Alfred Sant has said in Parliament.

He said that with the government's consumer protection structures showing themselves to be weak and the regulators not doing their duty, perhaps a way to bolster the consumer lobby would be to encourage and assist the trade unions to extend their activities to include consumer protection.

Dr Sant was speaking at the end of the debate on a Bill to bring about closer collaboration among various consumer protection organisations in line with EU directives.

He said consumers in Malta were on their own and lacked the resources or administrative mechanism to protect themselves. The government's consumer and market surveillance structures were far too weak, and indeed, there was no consumer protection mentality in the administration. That could be seen in the way that, for example, consumers were under-represented on the euro changeover committee, despite the impact on consumers which the decisions taken by this committee would have.

Dr Sant said rising prices of food and medicine were foremost in consumers' minds at present, yet the government was not taking effective action to address those concerns.

It was either a case of the regulators not doing their duty, or the free market not working in Malta.

Labour had already promised that when in government it would monitor food and medicinal prices every six months.

Once consumers lacked the mechanism to uphold their rights, the government needed to create such structures itself to mobilise consumers. It should encourage unions to extend their activities to consumer matters, providing a counter-balance to powerful companies and organisations that felt they could do whatever they wished.

Clearly, prices could not continue to rise unchecked because this was eroding the people's purchasing power, and it would continue to undermine competitiveness.

For a start, the authorities needed to stamp out the sharp variations in prices displayed in euros and Maltese liri.

But the government's focus on consumers also needed to extend to the provision of better services such as at the hospital, where queues were getting longer.

Earlier in the sitting, Opposition justice spokesman Anglu Farrugia hit out at the government over court tariffs and said the government and the opposition should jointly conduct an exercise to revise the tariffs which had impacted most strongly on ordinary people, denying them access to justice.

Dr Farrugia said that the government was taking decisions, such as the repeated tariff increases, without consultation. The hike in court fees had led to a dramatic drop in new cases as many people simply found they could not afford to take their cases to court.

This, however, was not the only problem at the law courts. Far too many cases were now no longer being heard by the ordinary courts but had been transferred to ad hoc tribunals headed by non-professional judges. This was harmful to the administration of justice.

Among the bodies that had criticised the government's handling of the justice system was the Commission for the Administration of Justice.

The situation at the law courts was getting chaotic.

The Labour MP also referred to the Tribunal for the Investigation of Injustice, saying it was unacceptable that people whose cases had been upheld had not been compensated yet.

Winding up, Competitiveness Minister Censu Galea referred to remarks regarding the transmission of World Cup games on television. He said it was easy to say that this or that organisation was not doing its duty, but there were a number of responsibilities which were bound to a number of issues not just in Malta but also overseas. There were rights based on consumer rights and other rights based on payment for the transmissions. No one was avoiding responsibilities, even if one did not achieve the solutions expected.

Mr Galea said consumer structures already existed, but some of the speakers seemed to forget that. The Consumer Claims Tribunal had existed for 10 years and the number of cases brought before it was rising. The Consumers' Division also tried to settle cases itself to avoid taking them before the tribunal.

In 2004 the division settled 496 issues and 240 others were withdrawn after matters were explained to the persons lodging the claims and they realised they did not have the rights they had thought they had.

This year 118 cases were settled by the division and 170 cases were withdrawn. In 1996 just 42 cases were decided by the tribunal, 76 per cent of them in favour of consumers. Last year, 90 per cent of the 330 cases decided had gone in favour of consumers.

On average, Mr Galea said, 85 per cent of cases decided by the tribunal were decided in favour of claimants.

Referring to comments about vehicle registration costs in Malta, the minister said that while it was true that other countries had a low registration tax, the road licence they paid each year was higher. If that system was to be adopted here it could turn out to be more costly for consumers.

Turning to euro adoption, Mr Galea said it was harmful to instil the idea that consumers would suffer in the run-up to the adoption of the common currency. The government would act to ensure no one abused the changeover.

Mr Galea said the main aim of the Bill was to guarantee the introduction of certain EU directives. It was true that consumer organisations were small and weak but in reality, the government should not set up or push consumer organisations, he said.