The General Workers’ Union has called for a revision in the cost-of-living-adjustment for pensioners, workers and their families which, it says, should be granted biannually to better reflect price movements.
This is one of the union’s main proposals for the forthcoming Budget, along with a repeated call for a staggered return of the public holidays “robbed” from workers when the Government “unilaterally” decided to stop compensating for holidays which fell on a weekend. These days should be handed back to workers over three years, it held.
Union general secretary Tony Zarb said his organisation was particularly worried that families, especially pensioners, were finding it difficult to make ends meet because of the increase in the cost of living in recent months.
“We believe granting the compensation every six months is the best way to compensate for the difficulties workers and pensioners are facing to keep up with the cost of living,” he said.
The union is also proposing changes to the formula used to calculate this compensation. Asked for the conclusions reached by a Malta Council for Economic and Social Development sub-committee tasked with proposing these changes, Mr Zarb said a report had been concluded and its contents had to be discussed by the individual organisations before being discussed at council level.
Other GWU proposals included an insistence on raising the minimum wage, something which has already been shot down by other social partners including other unions.
Even Labour Leader Joseph Muscat has come out against raising the minimum wage, saying this would not solve poverty and would instead burden businesses.
Furthermore, Mr Zarb laid stress on the need for more measures to discourage precarious work and the introduction of a rule under which workers’ contracts would be attached to government contracts by the companies that win them.
Mr Zarb also called for an immediate reduction in utility tariffs and the allocation of more resources to the Occupational Health and Safety Authority to carry out more inspections at places of work.
The union also called for action to reduce the price of gas, even though this market had been liberalised, to cut the price of medicines, reduce hospital waiting times and waiting lists, upgrade Gozo hospital and improve student stipends.