With reference to Svetlana Borg’s article Implications Of Maternity Leave Extension On Micro Enterprises (February 16), it should be pointed out that the cost of the additional weeks of maternity leave, as announced in the budget speech for 2012, is not being borne by employers and SMEs.
As from January 1, 2012 maternity leave was extended by two weeks, with the government paying a flat rate of €160 per week per mother. An additional two weeks will be added as from next January 1 taking up maternity leave to 18 weeks. The cost of the additional weeks of maternity leave is being borne by the government.
It must also be pointed out that as from this year, self-employed women will be paid for four weeks of maternity leave by the government. This is the first time that maternity leave is being paid to the self-employed.
In her article Ms Borg implied that the extension in maternity leave might potentially lead to job losses. She also argued that the employer “will face additional costs, principally because of the need to pay for the leave, engage substitute workers to replace the female employee on leave, advertise the position, and train the new worker”.
The government has already addressed this situation. Regulations guaranteeing the rights to workers employed by temping agencies, which came into force on December 5, 2011, will go a long way in encouraging more employers to introduce family-friendly measures at the place of work. It is hoped that more employers will realise that temping agencies could provide them with stop-gap solutions once any of their permanent workers go out on paternal, maternal, sickness or injury leave.
The increasing development of temporary work in Malta affords employers an increased flexibility. It is useful to have a pool of individuals in various fields who are readily available to industry to meet short-term requirements while avoiding delays caused by instituting formal recruitment procedures. It is increasingly being resorted to when employers have to cater for various absences of staff due to long leave, career breaks or other family-friendly measures which have been introduced over the past few years.
Over the years the Maltese government worked hard to encourage work-family balance and to encourage more women to play an active role and contribute directly to the economy. Today there are 12,000 more women working than there were in the year 2000.
This 10 per cent increase in female participation goes hand in hand with the increasing female student population in the tertiary level. For every four male students, we have six female students vying to further their education at this level. What a waste it would be if our country, our employers, our economy, would not be able to reap the dividends of all this investment in the education of all our students – whatever their gender – simply because women would keep dropping out once they start raising a family!
The government is also encouraging the use of childcare centres. Apart from investing in its own childcare centres, the government is helping the private sector tap EU funds to improve and upgrade its facilities. Currently in Malta there are 52 registered childcare centres whose facilities are used by over 1,500 children under the age of three. One must also keep in mind that over the last three years, more than 8,600 women have opted to return to work thus benefitting from a tax holiday by not paying income tax for one whole year.
All of the facts and initiatives mentioned above go to show that the extension in maternity leave will not impact on the livelihood of the self-employed and on the competitiveness of our SMEs and micro-enterprises.