Contrasting views on the labour market

The House of Representatives approved the financial estimates of the Employment and Training Corporation yesterday, after MPs gave contrasting views of the employment situation.

The debate started on Tuesday.

Nationalist MP Joseph Cassar focused on basic educational standards, saying that the number of children who left school before finishing form five should be brought down.

Some 80 per cent of the unemployed did not have ordinary level education, he said.

Turing to people with disability, Dr Cassar said that any person who had to undergo treatment for mental conditions should not be discriminated against.

Michael Asciak (PN) said that former drug addicts were finding it difficult to enter the job market. The ETC needed to coordinate with the state and church authorities to pair drug rehabilitation with employment, as otherwise efforts to rid such people of drug addiction would be lost.

Gozo Minister Giovanna Debono said that the unemployment rate in Gozo was not alarming, contrary to the impression the opposition tried to give.

Although in the past year two factories had closed down, unemployment in Gozo was much lower than it had been in 1997.

The factories, Ms Debono said, had closed because they had found a country where they could operate with cheap labour. The minister said that the National Plan for Employment also dealt with Gozo's problems.

The ETC had produced a report on government services which could be given in Gozo. The recommendations would be reviewed next year for a strategy for Gozo to be drawn up. Over the coming year the ETC would be starting new vocational training courses and training schemes in Gozo, with particular focus on tourism.

A scheme was being developed to help Gozitan graduates find work in Gozo.

Other schemes were aimed at business development.

Labour MP Marie Louise Coleiro said that even the National Action Plan for Employment had pointed out that Gozo suffered from a more serious unemployment problem than Malta.

She noted that the ETC annual report was saying that despite the fact that the number of job vacancies had dropped by 10 per cent, the number of placements only dropped by 2.5 per cent. The ETC should be worried even if the number of placements had dropped by 0.1 per cent.

The ETC had also said that the number of persons struck off the employment register was 45 per cent higher than last year. Had she been convinced all the people struck off were abusers she would have praised the ETC, but this figure would have included persons struck off inadvertently or for other reasons.

These people would suffer for months until their appeals were heard. Ms Coleiro complained that there were many employers who treated their workers like animals. People serving on a contract basis were dismissed left, right and centre and the ETC was told that such people resigned out of their own free will, when that was not the case.

Ms Coleiro regretted that a significant number of students were leaving school without qualifications, making it difficult for them to find jobs. And many were not able to make it to MCAST because of limited capacity.

There were also graduates who were not being employed in the areas they trained for. Ms Coleiro asked if it was the government's intention to review the Business Promotion Act in order to boost job creation..

According to a report in The Times of last May 26 about the Malta Employers' Association general conference, Malta would need to create 30,000 jobs, 10,000 more than normally generated to meet the requirements set by the EU on labour force participation rates.

The country's overall employment rate last December stood at 53.7 per cent but this had to go up to 70 per cent by 2010.

But jobs would only be created if the government created the proper conditions.

Carmelo Abela (MLP) underlined the need for employment, training and education to be brought closer together.

One problem was that wages in the construction industry, for example, were hardly any higher than unemployment benefit. This did not encourage the unemployed to seek work. And a percentage of employable persons did not see the need to register for employment.

Turning to the education sector, Mr Abela noted that according to unemployment statistics in September 2004 unskilled people accounted for 5,046 out of 7,382 registering in part one of the employment register.

Up to 2,000 left school every year without basic certificates.

The only way to attract foreign investment was by ensuring that Malta's educational levels stood at least equal to those in competitor countries.

Robert Arrigo (PN) said that each side of the House was interpreting the same statistics differently. That more graduates were seeking employment was only due to the fact that Nationalist administrations had made tertiary education available to many more students.

He was perturbed by the number of reported cases of foreign workers having been found at work illegally in Malta. A closer look all over the country would show that there were many more than reported.

The current restructuring of the Malta Tourism Authority should seek out the best possible recruits, rather than simply recycling employees. If the exercise was well carried out it would ensure better performance in the tourism sector.

If tourism increased to 1.5 million visitors it would mean the creation of hundreds of new jobs.

Mario Galea (PN) congratulated the ETC on its involvement in the National Action Plan on Employment. The plan was the first of its kind in Malta, confirmation of the government's serious outlook on the employment sector.

The study on the transition of young people in Malta from school to work was another ETC initiative that should be lauded. It had brought out the effect that students' experiences of secondary education had on their decision or acceptance to work in jobs well below their real potential.

All this disproved the opposition's claims that the government was doing nothing to improve the educational and employment sectors.

SMS-a-Job was an ETC initiative that was another step in the right direction.

In May 2004 the number of self-employed had increased by 277 over May 2003. Jobs in the private sector had increased by 440 and 87 per cent of the ETC's placements to full-time jobs had been in the private sector, vindicating the faith in this sector to generate future jobs. In contrast, in May 2004 the public sector had accounted for 1,096 fewer jobs than a year before. Part-time employment had increased by 2,535, mostly in cases where this was the primary job.

Malta's unemployment rate had been below the EU average since 1994, even though every unemployed person was one too many.

Mr Galea also praised the ETC and other government departments for their concerted drive to curb abuse in the employment sector. The corporation had worked in a difficult and continually changing environment over the past year, but had still registered success.

ETC, educators and parents must continue to hammer into Malta's youth the belief in their true potential to carve out a future, he concluded. Other speakers will be reported tomorrow. The estimates of the ETC were later approved after a division.