(Adds government's reaction)

ForUM, a gathering of a number of unions has threatened the government that unless it was given representation on the Malta Council for Economic and Social Development it would take all the industrial and legal steps necessary which were permissible by law.

ForUM has requested membership on the MCESD but was told by the Parliamentary Secretary for Public Dialogue Chris Said earlier this week that although the government had no objection, its membership had to be unanimously agreed by all the social partners.

In a letter to Dr Said, ForUM is insisting that it is Parliament’s responsibility to amend its legislation and of the government to ensure that all the people were represented within organisations, particularly the Malta Council for Economic and Social Development, which debated national subjects that determined its future.

The ForUM said it could not understand how the government was shirking from this fundamental responsibility, passing it on to the other social partners, who represented a section of the people who did not necessarily have the same interests as the members of unions within ForUM.

GOVERNMENT'S REACTION

In a reply sent to ForUM president John Bencini by e-mail today, Parliamentary Secretary Chris Said said that a union that threatened to halt discussing the interests of its members if it did not get what it wanted would only be abdicating its main responsibility.

Dr Said reiterated that the government had no objection to ForUM’s participation in the MCESD but that the government should not impose ForUM’s participation on the other members.

The MCESD, he noted, was set up by agreement between the social partners, who were its members. The government had agreed with the members that any expansion had to be done with the members’ consensus and it was not in a position to breach its word through arbitrary imposition.

The council had also been formed in a way to represent a delicate balance between workers and employers and this balance had to be retained.

If the MCESD agreed with ForUM’s request, the government was willing to move the required amendments without delay. Dr Said said that ForUM’s threat to stop discussing the interests of its workers in other important fora, such as MEUSAC and its sectoral committees, unless it was made a member of the MCESD, was irresponsible.

He said that ForUM had never replied to the requests and invitations from MEUSAC to actively take part in its structures, as was done by other Maltese unions.

Dr Said said he was willing to meet ForUM to discuss the interests of its members.