Employees working for private firms subcontracted by the government should enjoy the same salary structure of civil servants doing that particular job, Prime Minister Joseph Muscat said yesterday.

Addressing a political activity in Żebbuġ, he said that the government was working on a plan to address precarious employment. However, he cautioned that it would be wrong to rush any decisions in an attempt to gain political mileage for next week’s European Parliament elections.

Dr Muscat said the number of employees engaged by private contractors who were offering their services to government entities numbered some 2,700.

It was unacceptable that in some cases contractors were charging the government €12 an hour but employees were only receiving a third of that amount.

On irregular migration, he expressed his concern that the lack of coverage by the international media on the recent spate of tragedies reflected the apathy by the EU to address this issue.

Contractors charging €12 an hour but workers are only getting a third of that

Malta, he added, would stand to gain if Socialist candidate Martin Schulz was elected as European Commission President.

On his visit to Malta last week, Mr Schulz spoke of the need for new rules on migration and said he would make it a priority if elected.

The Prime Minister said that even if the PL maintained its 36,000 strong majority from the general election, the chances of repeating the feat of 2009, when the party won four out of the six seats up for grabs, were highly unlikely.

He added that that particular outcome was the result of a “statistical fluke”.