A Labour government will not raise the retirement age or introduce mandatory private pensions, party leader Joseph Muscat said yesterday as he dismissed an in-depth pensions report as “contradictory”.
The party would start gradually raising the minimum pension until it reached 60 per cent of the national average income
Dr Muscat argued that economic growth, coupled with more people in paid work and creating an incentive-driven voluntary private pension scheme, would be enough to ensure Malta’s pension system was sustained.
This flies in the face of what a Government-appointed pensions working group report found last year.
According to the report, even if workforce participation levels were to reach those of Sweden, Malta’s pension system would remain financially unsustainable.
The report also said a “second pillar” mandatory private pension structure was necessary; something social partners are consensually opposed to.
Its politically awkward recommendations have meant the report received little coverage, with the Family Ministry quietly publishing it online last May without telling the media and Labour never openly discussing its findings.
Challenged yesterday, Dr Muscat said parts of the report were “contradictory” and said its calls for a second pillar pension were opposed by all, including his party. He noted the Government had never spoken clearly about its findings.
But, aside from saying Labour was “confident” of its calculations, Dr Muscat did not explain why the party’s were right and the working group’s wrong.
Speaking outside Luqa’s St Vincent de Paul residential home for the elderly, he mentioned other proposals concerning ageing.
Labour would start gradually raising the minimum pension until it reached 60 per cent of the national average income, although Dr Muscat made it clear this would take at least two legislatures to accomplish.
Elderly people would no longer have to pay stamp duty for employing private carers, while day care centres would be turned into “lifelong learning hubs” in line with active ageing principles.
Reacting to this, the Parliamentary Secretariat for the Elderly said at the moment there were 21 day care centres for the elderly where lifelong learning was already being provided, including computer courses.
The PL would also ensure all retirement homes, private and public, were regulated by one comprehensive law, Dr Muscat said.
This law would lay out standards of care and ensure the rights of both residents and employees were safeguarded.
Elderly people also needed legal protection from professionals who sought to exploit their vulnerability for financial gain, he said.
Speaking during a later visit at Charella residential home, in Sliema, he added that Labour would set up resident committees to ensure old people had more say in the running of homes and day care centres.
On this the secretariat said this concept had already been introduced in St Vincent de Paul, where a board for elderly residents was operating.
There was another board run by relatives of the residents.
When questioned about his former deputy leader, Dr Muscat said Anġlu Farrugia knew that his participation as a PL delegate at a political conference in the Falklands would be announced during a party fundraiser on Sunday.
He declined to say when party officials had first approached Dr Farrugia with the offer.
Additional reporting by Claudia Calleja.