Irregular contracts that contain precarious working conditions offered to a group of workers already employed at the President’s Kitchen Garden were a big legal mess and had never been signed or enforced, President Marie Louise Coleiro Preca said this morning.

She was addressing a news conference held after The Sunday Times of Malta this morning published a story saying that the Kitchen Garden staff were offered these contracts, which, apart from offering a low hourly rate irrespective of how many hours they worked, employed workers on a casual basis.

The workers had refused to sign these contracts and the Office of the President withdrew them. However, some workers said that it was only after they reported the issue to the Industrial Relations Department that the President’s Office had told them the contracts would be revised.

Ms Coleiro Preca said the contract conflated three different forms of employment: contract for service, part-time and casual employment.

According to the contract seen by this newspaper, it was up to employees to pay their income tax and social security contributions and they would not have been entitled to any overtime or allowances even if they worked evenings or weekends, Sundays and public holidays.

Before publishing the story, Times of Malta, sought the President’s reaction and a spokeswoman for the Office of the President admitted that President Coleiro Preca was aware of the complaints, but she pointed out the contracts had not been signed because they were drafted incorrectly.

The spokeswoman added that the Office of the President became aware of the issue before a complaint had reached the Department of Industrial and Employment Relations.

Asked whether Ms Coleiro Preca was investigating who was responsible for these contracts, the President’s spokeswoman said that “this was not needed”. Ms Coleiro Preca clarified this morning that she knew exactly who had drafted the contract and the matter had been dealt with internally.

But Ms Coleiro-Preca this morning said the reporting in The Sunday Times of Malta was selective and aimed at tarnishing her reputation which she has been building for 40 years.

There were no precarious working conditions, she insisted, because the contracts were at a draft stage and never signed or put into practice.

The Kitchen Garden, the President said, has 26 employees and the draft contract had been given to four to view.

She said she had no knowledge of it and, on seeing it on Friday, it was clear to her that there was a massive legal mess.

Ms Coleiro Preca said that on taking over the Presidency she found that there was a need to regularise workers’ conditions and to address the major mismanagement and precarious working conditions. Some workers had a collective agreement which dated back to 2002, some were registered with the Employment and Training Corporation and others were not.

Breaks did not exist, she continued, while others were not paid for the working hours spent before and after the Kitchen Garden’s opening times.

There were workers who used to work at the times of their choosing, with the Kitchen Garden being left with not enough servers in peak hours as a result.

The President held a total of nine meetings with workers, the latest on April 29.

“We wanted to correct work practices and regularise the workers’ situation.”

She reiterated that this matter made her feel that she was under a personal attack and insisted that she would never promote precarious working conditions.