The Malta Employers’ Association has criticised unions accusing them of giving the impression all employers were involved in malpractice with regard to their workers.

Unions were repeatedly resorting to anecdotal evidence or exceptional cases, which, the MEA insisted, misled public perception, such as claims that an employer was paying his employees for 20 hours a week when they were actually working 30. Challenging unions to back up the claims they were making, the MEA said the unions should immediately contact the relevant authorities if they were aware of malpractices. It promised to give its full backing to any investigations into such cases.

“Any union which is privy to such information and does not act is condoning such practices but if the information is based on hearsay, then unions should simply refrain from bringing such matters to public attention until they have the necessary evidence,” the MEA said.

It highlighted another “incidence of misguided opinion”, this time in relation to the number of people employed on part-time and definite period contracts and the number of self-employed.

“The truth is Malta has one of the lowest incidences of part-time and definite period employees in Europe.

“The percentage of self-employed people – 11.8 per cent – has remained stable for more than 10 years. If it were true employers are abusing of self-employed contracts this number would have surely increased,” the MEA said.