The long-awaited amendments

The announcement that, as from July 1, workers whose primary earnings derive from a part-time job and work a minimum of eight hours weekly will benefit from pro rata sick leave, leave, bonuses etc. should be praised however overdue this outcome is.

Positive action that favours and promotes better working conditions should always be applauded, especially so in times of sheer discrimination and exploitation of workers.

Legal Notice 164 of 2007, granting the above-mentioned benefits to part-time workers, did not fall from heaven. It was due to the efforts and the hard work put in by the trade unions, mostly the General Workers' Union, that had for long, not only exposed, but fought the exploitation part-time workers in certain sectors, namely the security sector, were made to endure.

So much so that immediately after the publication of the original legal notice, the GWU harshly opposed the entitlement of pro rata benefits to part-time employees who worked 20 hours and over, only as the union deemed the measure as a means of legalising abuse and the exploitation of part-time workers.

Prior to July 1, unscrupulous employers were riding roughshod over the advantages emerging from the law by employing workers for 19 and a half hours in order to bypass the legal provisions stipulating the granting of benefits to part-time employees working not less than 20 hours a week.

Paradoxically enough, such abuse and exploitation of workers occurred within the parameters of the legal notice as certain employers went around its provisions by setting up within their structures several other companies under different names in order to carry out the same services and using the same employees who were made to work a maximum of 19 hours a week with each of the different companies. In some cases employees were working more than 40 hours a week and still denied their pro rata benefits.

This was happening as the law considered such workers as being employed by different companies. The GWU on various occasions spoke out loudly of such abuses and how they were carried on unhindered.

The GWU did not stay put after voicing its concerns. It continued to exert pressure on the authorities to bring them to remedy without hesitation such an unfair situation and, therefore, do justice with the part-time workers.

It raised the issue with the Malta Employers' Association and even took it to Prime Ministerial level and as far as the General Assembly of the International Labour Organisation. And all this in order to alleviate the shameful situation part-time workers were thrown in.

In addition, it was the GWU, and the GWU alone, that demanded within the Employment and Labour Relations Board the repeal of the original legal notice so that part-timers will be entitled to pro rata benefits irrespective of the amount of hours they worked during the week.

What the GWU did and is still doing to recover for the workers the lost vacation leave in lieu of public holidays falling on a weekend, and what it did for justice to be done with part-timers is there for everyone to see. This is so, even if the GWU does not always blow its trumpet to publicise what it is doing to rectify the injustices suffered by certain categories of workers. For the GWU, doing one's duty and carrying one's obligations towards the workers, whether organised or not, is not a case for spin.

By adopting a pro-active stand, in Malta and internationally, the GWU did not only promote the rights of part-time workers by putting pressure on the government but was also, even if indirectly, trying to shield all the responsible and sensible employers against unjust competition and, thus, defending their investment and protecting the jobs of their employees. This in view of the frequent cases where the first would-be victims of unjust competition are always the jobs of workers and/or their working conditions.

Against this backdrop, one would have to be either very naive about what's going on in the industrial relations sector or particularly partisan against the GWU not to observe and recognise the union's hard work to protect the workers' rights and to promote social justice in our country. The issue of legal notice 164 of 2007 amending the Employment and Industrial Relations Act is a case in point.

Mr Zarb is secretary general of the GWU.