Former employee challenges dockyards restructuring law

A former dock worker filed a constitutional application in the First Hall of the Civil Court yesterday against the Attorney General and the minister responsible for government investments.

Lawrence Bilocca claimed that his fundamental human right to seek recourse to the Industrial Tribunal had been violated by the 2003 law governing the restructuring of the dockyards.

Mr Bilocca claimed that he had been employed by the Malta Drydocks Corporation for 28 years. In November 2003, he was informed he had been transferred to Industrial Projects and Services Ltd rather than to Malta Shipyards Ltd and that his employment with the drydocks had been terminated.

Mr Bilocca filed an application before the Industrial Tribunal claiming his transfer was in violation of the law governing industrial relations. However, the provisions of the law governing the restructuring of the dockyards had deprived him of his right to have recourse to the Industrial Tribunal. This law, Mr Bilocca argued, stipulated that notwithstanding the provisions of any other law, any employee of the Malta Drydocks Corporation (who had been employed prior to the coming into force of the law in question) had to be transferred to and employed by one of the two companies established by that law.

The 2003 law, he said, had the cumulative effect of depriving him of his civil rights against his employer and he was being deprived of his right to continue his action before the Industrial Tribunal.

This was in violation of his rights as protected by the European Convention of Human Rights.

Mr Bilocca therefore asked the court to declare that the provisions of the 2003 law governing the restructuring of the dockyards were inconsistent with his fundamental human rights.

Dr Karmenu Mifsud Bonnici signed the application.