The Times’ leader of October 1 stated: “Let unions negotiate pay rises within the context of collective agreements.”

Collective agreements make sense when trade union affiliation is compulsory.

Our Constitution merely protects one’s right to join a union.

When union negotiators are themselves government employees, the question of potentially conflicting interests produces victims, sometimes plenty of them.

Back in 1971, the Government withheld the appointment on the pensionable establishment of about 100 teachers capriciously for about 30 months.

In 1974, the Malta Union of Teachers concluded an agreement specifying six years of service on the pensionable establishment for a teacher to be promoted from grade I to grade II.

These six years translated to eight-and-a-half years for this forsaken category who had to start from the bottom rung. Unaffiliated teachers did well.

Non-collective agreements of this kind contrast sharply with the fair anomalies commission exercise headed by Salvino Busuttil around 1966. This was the nearest to being free from conflicting interests.

Before this 1966 exercise, the weekly salary of a teacher was about €2.33 more than that of a latrine attendant. This time, the negotiators hid under the mantle of “collective” bargaining.

In 2005/6, another agreement was signed by the union presidents to assure that a scale 1 salary shall attract four times the salary of a government worker in scale 20.

Those in scale 7, who turned 61 in 2006, as is evident from the figures in parentheses in column 3 (see table below), were offered a “rise” of negative €34.95 in salary, the cost of living allowance (COLA) being superior to the reorganisation step of €237.66 by €34.95! This time it was not a Labour minister

So who are the shot-at marines? Who is suffering the freeze, the minimum wage earners or yours truly and his ilk?