Editorial

As the last of the younger set of English language students return home at the end of the peak season, they leave behind a booming industry. About 70,000 foreign students are expected to have visited Malta by the end of this year. The sector has been growing for the past nine years, in sharp contrast with the rest of the tourism industry which has only just come out of a six-year dip. About Lm26.5 million will this year be injected into the economy from English language schools alone.

However, the students also leave in their wake an image problem, both domestically and internationally. Reports in the Swedish press have been particularly lurid, leaving the reader with a picture of foreign students enjoying Malta's Sodom and Gomorrah lifestyle of "sex on the beaches and unlimited access to alcohol, drugs and nightlife". This is the sort of publicity Malta could well do without.

Domestically, people are aghast at the impact of foreign students in popular tourist areas. Complaints from hotel guests and locals of rowdy and unruly behaviour have multiplied. The sight of Paceville full of drunken, feral youths vomiting and urinating in people's gardens, combined with complaints about litter on the roads and on beaches, have fostered an image of lawlessness from this particular niche of the tourism industry which cries out for better regulation and control.

What is to be done? There are three key players who now need to plan a determined and concerted response to this phenomenon before next summer. They are the Federation of English Language Teaching Organisations Malta (Feltom), the Malta Tourism Authority (MTA) and the police.

Feltom must ensure that the language schools exercise proper control over their charges. They have a duty of care which goes beyond the classroom and the organised outings. Their choice of host families and the hotels where students are accommodated must be scrupulously vetted and supervision over them properly exercised. Schools must be ruthless in stamping out unruly behaviour and ensure that their responsibility does not end when the daily teaching programme has been completed. There is a strong argument for making it the responsibility of the English language schools to provide adequate additional security in hotels where students are housed in numbers to ensure their good order and discipline.

The police have, as always, a vital role in exercising authority in those areas, such as Paceville, where youths congregate in their hundreds. The police presence in such areas has been inadequate to the task. The rule of law has been openly flouted. Sale of alcohol to minors and the reckless behaviour of inebriated teenagers have not been effectively stamped upon. Police patrols in night shots like Paceville must be stepped up in July and August - when 75 per cent of all foreign students arrive here.

The MTA is the meat in the sandwich. As the guardian of Malta's tourism product, it has to ensure that the various bodies - the GRTU, the MHRA, Fatta, Feltom, the ADT and the police - work together to ensure that this important segment of the industry is not undermined by the indiscipline of a few students, perhaps enjoying their first taste of freedom from home in a foreign land. On the contrary, with proper organisation and control, these students should leave Malta having learnt English and had an enjoyable experience which they will wish to repeat when they grow up and are free to travel back for themselves.