The Labour Party highlighted Malta’s poor showing in a European innovation scoreboard, which placed the island in the “below average” group of countries.
A third of students are falling out of the education system
Labour MP Owen Bonnici pointed out that Germany, Finland, Sweden and Denmark were the most successful in innovation but even small countries like Cyprus and Estonia placed in the top 16.
On the other hand, Malta fell in the “moderate innovators” category, placing 20th out of 27.
Comparatively, the non-EU Iceland was faring much better, Dr Bonnici said.
Dr Bonnici said the innovation scoreboard shed a negative light on Malta’s performance in the areas of research and innovation and highlighted problems of poor rates of graduates and high rates of school dropouts.
He said a third of students were falling out of the education system, which had improved in terms of access but not in terms of success rates.
While there was a substantial improvement in the number of people acquiring doctorates and a marginal improvement in the areas of patents, trademarks and scientific publications, the country still had an “immensely” negative record in the post-secondary and tertiary sectors, he said.
Malta saw a substantial drop in the growth rate of 30-34-year-olds concluding their tertiary education. While in Latvia there was an increase of 14 per cent and 10 per cent in Slovenia, the rate in Malta was moving backwards, he said.
He said the government was not sending the right message because it was not investing enough in research and innovation in the public sector.
Dr Bonnici accused the Prime Minister of hiding the truth when he said in January that the rate of students pursuing post-secondary education rose from 43 to 73 per cent. Dr Bonnici said this contrasted sharply with the figure quoted recently by Family Minister Chris Said who put the figure at 63 per cent.
The Education Ministry pointed out that the figure quoted by the Prime Minister included 17-year-olds while that referred to by Dr Said focused on 18-24-year-olds.
The ministry said Labour was making a desperate attempt to blur the good results being achieved in the sector, interpreting figures incorrectly.