Joseph Farrugia, director-general of the Malta Employers’ Association, has called for the establishment of a code of ethics to ensure that a union does not attempt to poach members from another union that is engaged in collective bargaining with a company.
Addressing a conference on Friday entitled ‘The future of the labour market in Malta’, on the occasion of the MEA’s 50th anniversary, Mr Farrugia said that rivalry between unions was worrying and “threatened to destabilise the working environment in many companies”.
He acknowledged, however, that on the whole, Malta enjoyed stable and healthy industrial relations through a positive dialogue between employers and unions.
Mr Farrugia said that following intensive and productive discussions at the employment relations board there should be a practical outcome to the issue of union recognition. He added that the MEA had presented numerous concrete proposals for a reform of the Employment and Industrial Relations Act “to adjourn labour legislation with contemporary and future requirements”.
In his presentation, Mr Farrugia touched upon various aspects of the Maltese labour market, with particular reference to issues related to industrial relations. He stressed the need to base policy decision making “on factual information rather than perceptions”, citing the example of precarious employment, which he maintained has neither been defined nor measured adequately.
The MEA director-general mentioned the structural changes in the labour supply due to demographic changes, increased participation by women and people who reached retirement age, and the influx of foreign workers, which currently stands at 13 per cent of the working population. Mr Farrugia underscored the need for skills management to avoid a mismatch between industry requirements and educational output.
He described the recent publication of the employability index report as “a positive step” towards aligning the educational sector with the demand for skills, and called for more of an effort to be made to reduce the number of school dropouts.
Mr Farrugia projected that in the future there will be demand for more flexible types of work organisation, such as flexi-time, atypical work and teleworking arising from changing work exigencies and also from a demand for such employment practices by employees.