Family Minister Dolores Cristina told Parliament yesterday that she agreed with the opposition motion on strengthening the family, which proposed the creation of a Permanent Committee for the Family, but warned against ignoring the work achieved by the House Social Affairs Committee, which looked at a number of family issues. She emphasised that only if these two committees worked in synergy would the aims of the motion be reached.
Visibly moved, Mrs Cristina referred to emotional poverty which she termed as “frightening” and said no state could provide children with the stability and security they were entitled to in the family. She declared that her heart bled every time she had to sign a care order for a child to be taken under the wings of the state. She was in favour of such children being either fostered or adopted if they could not live in peace within their natural family.
There was a lack of people with the necessary expertise and hence the heavy workload every social worker had to carry. The number of people with problems contacting Appoġġ had increased considerably. Twenty years ago victims of domestic violence had only the Church to revert to. Similarly the aged, and Mrs Cristina announced that a study was being made to see how these could be kept living within the family.
She quoted a European report, which carried an analysis of the family and future scenarios until 2035. All stakeholders agreed that it was essential for families to have a sense of well-being, despite economic, health or other inherent problems. One of the conditions to achieve this sense of well being was through the way of life, education, employment, one’s expectations and housing facilities. Certain people also felt threatened by technology. However, there was less social exclusion.
The government had introduced family-friendly measures to allow couples to balance work and family obligations.
Of particular concern was financial, cultural and emotional poverty. These must be eradicated, she said. The circle must be broken by existing incentives. Education had provided new job opportunities and given personal satisfaction to many.
Minister Cristina took the opposition to task for giving the impression that hardly anything had been done to strengthen the family. She said political convenience led to negativism, ignoring what had been achieved in education, like the provision of counselors to help children with problems from a tender age.
To counter the negative aspects contained in the 2006 international report on child poverty presented on Monday by Leo Brincat (PL), the minister quoted from a European report which showed that Malta was among those countries at the top of the list whose citizens were satisfied with life and did not feel socially excluded. Technology-wise, 88.8 per cent of Maltese families with children owned a computer.
In material deprivation, Malta was only five percentage points less than the European average of 17 per cent. Among people who could not afford four out of seven items, Malta registered four per cent as against the 8.5 per cent average.
Mrs Cristina recalled other family-friendly measures such as the 2008 reform in children’s allowance and job creation when the rest of Europe was on its knees under the burden of the economic crises. Malta had one of the lowest unemployment rates of 6.2 per cent.
The opposition claimed that many government-announced friendly-measures remained on paper. The minister said that in 2006 there were 1,432 public sector employees benefitting from such measures. The figure grew to 3,079 last year.
The minister said that the private sector, especially companies who employed women of child-bearing age, was also waking to the idea of family-friendly measures. The government was also ready to help the sector introduce such measures so that couples could enjoy the family. Otherwise, these employees would be denied this sense of well-being
Mrs Cristina quoted another report called What Matters To Mothers In Europe, and it was found that many mothers had the same expectations as those of Maltese: 63 per cent wanted to do part-time work to see to their family responsibilities.
The minister paid tribute to voluntary organisations, saying that the state offered them financial aid to the tune of €2.5 million. A study was being undertaken to introduce social benefits changes for people with disability to see that these do not disincentive those seeking employment.
She also said that the National Family Commission would soon be re-appointed on different terms of reference to be complimentary to the university’s Institute for the Family.