“Excessive” public sector employment is costing each taxpayer €750 annually, shadow employment minister Therese Comodini Cachia said yesterday.
Dr Comodini Cachia told a press conference the additional public sector jobs created by the Labour administration cost about €60 million every year, amounting to about €315 million by the end of the legislature. This, she added, would see a family of four pay €3,000 every year.
She was joined by PN deputy leader Mario de Marco, who said that, since coming to power in 2013, the government had engaged about 3,600 people as well as replacements for those who had retired.
In total, the government had added about 6,000 people to the public sector, an increase of about 10 per cent.
Dr de Marco said this had brought the country back to the highest levels of public employment since 2005, the year the government had introduced a series of initiatives to reduce “bloated” State employment. “We had a trend of reducing the public sector and now we have seen this turn around completely. This needs to be addressed,” he said.
The government has added about 6,000 people to the public sector, an increase of about 10 per cent. This has brought Malta back to the highest levels of public unemployment since 2005
The bonanza of State jobs runs contrary to a government plan sent to Brussels back in 2013, in which Finance Minister Edward Scicluna had pledged to reduce the number of public sector employees by 500 during 2014 as a deficit-reduction measure.
Quoting from the pledge, Dr de Marco pointed out that the new jobs were not all essential employees such as teachers, doctors and nurses. On the contrary, those employed were doing all sorts of jobs and many had been hired on a position of trust basis.
Illustrating what he described as the “abusive” public sector over-employment, Dr de Marco said that the Water Services Corporation had increased its workforce by 15 per cent since the change in government.
Shadow health minister Claudette Buttigieg also expressed concerns. However, hers were aimed at the calibre of people being employed in top public sector posts rather than the amounts.
She said the CEO of Mater Dei Hospital, Ivan Falzon, was under-qualified to head the hospital and questioned the decision to remove Dolores Gauci from her position as CEO of Mount Carmel Hospital.
“We had one of the most senior and qualified people heading Mount Carmel and she was removed without an explanation,” she said.
Ms Buttigieg said she had been receiving complaints about a person recently employed in a senior position at the ambulance department who had been “bullying” other staff members and was not qualified enough to fill the post.
Picking up on this, Dr Comodini Cachia said the government had been providing “jobs for the boys”, which conflicted with the Labour Party’s electoral pledge of more meritocracy.