A substantial amount of money spent by authorities investigating workers’ rights’ breaches was being spent on only a few employers, Prime Minister Joseph Muscat said.
Economic growth had emphasized the loopholes in EU directives that Malta had transposed years before, Dr Muscat said. For instance, third-country companies were employing third-country nationals in an EU country, he said.
Some employers were trying to circumvent regulations to try and take advantage of both Maltese and foreign workers, he said, adding this was creating an imbalance in the workforce.
"This is our challenge: to ensure everyone is treated equally and strengthen enforcement so that no one will be put in conditions inferior to those we have regulated,” he said.
The prime minister was speaking at a conference on the future of work, during which a number of stakeholders, including the Department of Industrial and Employment Relations and trade unionists were present.
Seven of 10 people on the benefit tapering scheme continued to work even when they stopped receiving benefits. Admitting he had had apprehensions about the scheme, Dr Muscat said he was ultimately happy the government had taken the step.
The benefit tapering scheme provides support to people who have been receiving unemployment assistance, social assistance or single parent benefits, helping them to enter the employment market.
Turning to the gender pay gap, Dr Muscat said it had increased as more women entered the workforce.
"I prefer this problem to not having women working,” he said, adding that the kind of work women did would now need to be taken into account.
Dr Muscat also said a committee was conducting a review of minimum wage that would determine the necessary increase. "This is a breakthrough from both the government’s and the stakeholders’ end," he said.
Malta needs to be ‘future-proof’
Speaking at the end of the session, Parliamentary Secretary for EU funds Aaron Farrugia said Malta needed to become future-proof.
"It’s important to talk about workers’ rights, but we need to see how we are going to move forward,” he said.
"The world is becoming more globalised and that is why I have a problem with people saying we need to bring in a certain type of worker,” Dr Farrugia said.
He called for people to double down on lifelong learning, saying professionals now have to compete with workers in different countries, that were available immediately and at all times.