GRTU complains of migrants' employment 'chaos'

The GRTU has written to the government calling for regularisation of the current “chaotic” employment system.

It said a number of its members from the construction, repair, and especially from the waste sectors “depend” on the employment of migrants.

Employers go to Marsa early in the morning, pick up the number of migrants they need and pay each individual migrant cash plus provision of food and drink. The migrants often object to the standard rate and refuse to work, whereupon the employer goes back to Marsa for another group of workers, the GRTU said.

“The present system is causing unnecessary pressure on employers as they do not have the necessary cash to pay on a daily basis for employment service which effectively avails all other legal implications, most of all, the payment of social contributions,” the GRTU said.

“The current system also discriminates against Maltese workers. Maltese workers are paid on a weekly or bi-weekly basis and receive no additional subsistence while the migrant worker gets subsistence, loggings and daily food and is paid cash on a daily basis.”

The chamber said it had proposed a system that removed the ugly and unacceptable daily scenes at Marsa and elsewhere where migrants congregate to seek employment.

The proposed system is based on a temporarily casual work relationship and on effectively sustaining businesses who need a regular flow of workers, though not necessarily the same individuals, to meet their obligations under contract, the GRTU said.

This would effectively remove the uncertainties that existed, both fiscal and security wise, and in terms of labour laws, the chamber said.

It would also regularise the issue of social contributions paid by migrants.