The business community is gearing up for a clash with the government over its plans to exclude firms from its proposed compensation for last week’s nationwide blackout.
The Malta Employers’ Association and the Chamber of Commerce, Enterprise and Industry yesterday harshly criticised the government’s decision and said businesses should be the first to be compensated for the substantial losses they suffered.
The reactions come after a government spokesman told The Sunday Times of Malta that only domestic users left without electricity for more than 12 hours would be compensated. Businesses would be excluded.
We have suffered millions in losses and we are asking the government to tell us how we are going to be compensated
Last Tuesday, the entire island was plunged into darkness after an explosion at a Marsa power distribution centre caused the Delimara power plant to shut down.
The GRTU – which represents small businesses – is also taking a stand and yesterday sent a letter to Energy Minister Konrad Mizzi calling for an urgent meeting to discuss compensation.
“We have suffered millions in losses and we are asking the government to tell us who and how we are going to be compensated,” GRTU president Paul Abela said.
“It does not make sense that households are compensated, while restaurateurs and the entertainment industry, which had to close shop and send workers home while losing millions, will get nothing,” he said.
The same position was taken by the other two major organisations representing business in Malta.
Unlike the GRTU, which is asking for proportionate compensation for all those who suffered from the power cuts, both the chamber and the MEA said their members should get priority over households and not the other way round as was being proposed by the government.
“We are surprised and disappointed at the news confirming that businesses shall not benefit from any compensation for losses incurred as a result of last week’s blackout,” the chamber said in a statement.
“The business community should be the first beneficiary of compensation, as it is the business community that creates the country’s wealth, which is then distributed by households.”
According to the chamber, during last week’s blackout – which in some localities lasted for more than 18 hours – it was the business community, in a wide cross section of sectors that “suffered the greatest blow”.
The MEA, which represents big industries, called on the government to pay for damages, including “payment of wages due to the power cut”.
Sustaining its argument that the government should choose business over households, the association argued that as businesses were charged higher electricity rates than households, “businesses deserve priority in any compensation awarded for power cuts”.
Until now, compensation has never been granted to anyone following any power cut.
However, following last week’s outage, the government said it was toying with the idea of giving some form of compensation to households who had their power interrupted for more than 12 hours.
No details have been given on the scheme while Energy Minister Konrad Mizzi has not made any public appearance since the power failure.
A government spokesman said a formula was being worked out that would give users a discount on a day’s worth of electricity multiplied by a “yet-to-be established” denominator. He added that the commercial community would be completely excluded from any form of compensation.
The spokesman argued that households and families, not businesses, were Enemalta’s main customers.
He said the State energy provider was not issuing compensation but “giving a cheque to Enemalta, which it will distribute in the best manner”.
Sources close to Enemalta yesterday told Times of Malta the corporation was still awaiting instructions from the government on how the compensation formula would be drawn up.
According to the sources, avoiding discrimination among clients was one of the main concerns being evaluated before a final decision by the government was communicated to the State-owned corporation.