The gap between rich and poor in Malta has continued to rise since the Labour Party regained power in 2013. Not all the population has benefitted from the economic development and prosperity that the country has experienced, with the economic pie being unfairly distributed among its citizens.
The Labour Party has lost its social soul with the Labour government brushing aside its moral and ethical obligations towards those most in need and, instead, concentrating on improving the financial well-being of its political clique and people close to them.
The election promise made by Joseph Muscat that Labour would eradicate precarious labour during its first legislature did not materialise, like so many other promises he has gone back on after he took office and became Prime Minister.
One can recall how vociferous the General Workers’ Union used to be about precarious labour at the time of the Nationalist government. It accused the government of issuing low payments for outsourcing and subcontracting, with the consequence that subcontractors were not left with enough money to pay a decent wage to the workers after deducting the costs to cover national insurance, leave and sick leave.
However, once the Labour Party rose to power, the GWU, known for its traditional alliance to the party, quickly changed tactics to the extent of encouraging precarious work through a multi-million euro deal it signed with the Labour government. This deal enabled the union to receive €980 a month for each unemployed person it took from JobsPlus and who was placed on a minimum wage and therefore paid less than his work colleagues for the same work.
The last election campaign slogan L-Aqwa Żmien (The Best of Times) certainly does not apply to the many pensioners and families with a low income who are struggling to make ends meet.
It could very well be the best of times for Deborah Schembri, whose income through public contracts she has been awarded by direct orders, is estimated at well over €160,000 a year.
When Schembri held the office of parliamentary secretary during the previous legislature, she had signed a contract for Johann Buttigieg as executive chairman of the Planning Authority that carried a package that amounted to over €102,000 a year. Apart from making Buttigieg one of Malta’s highest-paid public officers, interestingly enough, this contract included a clause that entitles his heirs to the equivalent of two years of his salary in case of his death, either due to natural or accidental causes unrelated to his work.
After Schembri lost her seat in Parliament in the last election, Buttigieg awarded her, through direct order, a contract worth €42,000 a year specifically to give him legal advice. This contract was given to Schembri despite the fact that the Planning Authority already had a contract for the provision of legal services with a law firm run by Labour MP and legal consultant to the Prime Minister, Robert Abela, and his wife Lydia, the Labour Party’s executive secretary. By last year, the PA had already paid more than €500,000 to the firm.
Schembri’s income also includes payment-per-case for legal consultancy with earnings estimated to reach tens of thousands of euros, according to another direct contract she was given by the Lands Authority. In addition, she receives €56,000 every year for her employment with Identity Malta and a financial package worth €60,654 for a 35-hour week job at the Office of the Prime Minister.
At the same time, workers on a minimum wage receive €4.31 per hour while it is known that some subcontractors pay their workers as little as €1.90 an hour for work carried out at home. This contrasts sharply with the €100 an hour being paid from taxpayer money to former tourism minister Edward Zammit Lewis for his consultancy post with Identity Malta given to him by direct contract. Before being given this contract, he was already being paid €26,000 by the same agency for a similar consultancy that was procured by another direct order. In addition, he receives a yearly honorarium of €21,000 as an MP.
Privacy and confidentiality have been brought up as an alibi to withhold information about several contracts of consultants directly appointed by ministers
Another former minister who is being paid handsomely is Manuel Mallia. He is considered to be the Labour Party’s richest MP. Apart from a part-time consultancy post given to him by the Prime Minister, for which he is paid €56,000 annually, he receives about €23,000 from the Occupational Health and Safety Authority, to which the government has appointed him as chairman, of course, apart from a yearly MP honorarium of €21,000.
Privacy and confidentiality have been brought up as an alibi to withhold information about several contracts of consultants directly appointed by ministers.
Government-awarded contracts continue to be based on friendship with people in the high echelons of government and loyalty to the political party in power, rather than purely pragmatic grounds.
Despite the astounding generosity being shown to them, certain people close to the Prime Minister and his political party do not seem to be satisfied with lucrative contracts that are being dished out to them.
These individuals have taken up private work or engaged themselves in business to further augment their income. This has often resulted in a direct conflict of interest. Yet, the government continues to show its disposition to accommodate them.
A case in point that has been recently revealed concerns former Labour Party CEO James Piscopo. On being appointed Lands Authority CEO, he failed to declare his personal business interests as a business partner of the owners of a hotel with whom the regulator was in negotiations.
Piscopo demonstrated similar unethical behaviour in his previous position of executive chairman of Transport Malta, to which he was appointed with a yearly salary of €85,000 shortly after Labour swept to power in 2013. With the full blessing of Minister Joe Mizzi, who happens to be his wife’s uncle-in-law, Piscopo had set up a personal holding company to conduct private consultancy work he registered on the same address of a property rented by Transport Malta.
The government has shown itself weak with powerful property entrepreneurs and other business operators. It struck deals that enabled them to make exorbitant profits while at the same time failed to take due cognizance of the citizens’ rights and legitimate interests. In this respect, parcels of public land that could serve the public good have been given away by the government to certain particular entrepreneurs.
A recent case that has attracted considerable criticism concerns the granting by the government to db Group of 24,000 square metres of prime public land at the former Institute of Tourism Studies site in St George’s Bay on a 99-year emphyteusis for a pittance of €15 million. The Planning Authority subsequently approved an application by db Group owner Silvio Debono for a development permit to construct the City Centre multi-use project on the land in question despite the deleterious effect this monstrous project will have upon residents living in the surrounding areas.
The PA’s executive chairman even went to the extent of hiring a private plane for the sum of €8,750 to fly a member of the Planning Board to Malta from Sicily, where she was on holiday, and back, so she could vote on the application. This member eventually voted in favour of the application.
Here, one notes that the same member had absented herself for over a third of the board hearings last year, without apparently anything being done about it by Buttigieg.
The db Group’s project includes the building of a 17-storey, 5-star hotel consisting of 315 rooms under the Hard Rock franchise with a casino constructed on three floors, a 38-storey tower having 209 residences, a commercial office space, a shopping mall expected to be the biggest in Malta, restaurants and a basement car park.
The residential units are being sold on plan at prices based on floor level, size, view and the number of bedrooms, in certain cases exceeding €4 million. In addition, the buyers would be obliged to pay €23.4 million for redemption of the ground rent.
Facts speak for themselves. This is a government of the rich, by the rich for the rich.
Denis Tanti is a former assistant director (industrial and employment relations) in the Ministry for Health.
This is a Times of Malta print opinion piece