Galea reacts to EU report on workforce education levels

Education Minister Louis Galea yesterday reacted to EU figures showing that Malta's workforce is the least educated in the European Union, pointing out that substantial progress had been registered in the past few years.

He told Parliament during a debate on the EU's Lisbon agenda that such figures referred to a very great extent to generations who had been educated under the Labour governments. Much of the progress achieved by Malta under the Lisbon agenda targets was due to the strategies of Nationalist governments. Had Labour been in government, one would not even be discussing the Lisbon agenda, let alone trying to achieve its targets.

Dr Galea also pointed out that the EU figures were three years old when vocational institutions in Malta, such as Mcast, were still finding their feet.

He said comparisons between countries, such as those on the Lisbon agenda scoreboard, were viewed by the government as a spur for it to better focus its attention where it was most needed. But to be fair, one needed to keep in mind where Malta had started off from.

The comparisons needed to be viewed against the fact that Malta had started on the Lisbon agenda targets five years after they were set. Many of the countries against which the comparisons were being made had been in the EU for a long time and had been receiving development assistance for years, such as in the case of Ireland.

Figures for the local education sector actually showed substantial progress in the past few years. The number of students who had followed post-secondary or higher education courses rose to 19,000 in 2004 from 10,600 a decade before.

The percentage of women at the university had jumped from 48 per cent to 57 per cent of the total university population last year.

As for early school leavers, compulsory school age in Malta was currently up to 16 but in the EU the practice was for all students to remain at school up to 18 . Still, the number of 17-year-olds in education had risen strongly in Malta, from 43 per cent in 1999 to 66 per cent last year.

A study by the university showed that 26 per cent of 22-year-olds had followed a university course last year. If one were to include those following national diploma or higher national diploma courses in technical and vocational institutions, this figure would be substantially higher and it was set to rise even more in the near future.

The university was admitting 2,000 new students every year. Another 1,700 new students were joining the Junior College and 2,000 were joining Mcast every year, showing that Malta's figures were gradually getting closer to the Lisbon agenda targets, although there was more work to be done.

There was no denying that too few Maltese students were following courses in the sectors which the economy needed most, such as the sciences, engineering and technology. Last year, only 6.5 per cent of university students were in science-related or engineering-related courses.

The situation was better at the Junior College, where the percentage of students studying maths, science and technology was close to 30 per cent of the college population.

There were also hundreds of adults following evening courses run by Mcast.

Clearly, Dr Galea said, the road ahead was a long one, and much remained to be done by both policy makers and operators at all levels, but the results which were being achieved showed that reforms were gradually yielding their fruit.

In seeking to achieve the Lisbon agenda targets, Malta needed to overcome the challenges of competitiveness, and this was a government priority. Malta needed to instil a sense of entrepreneurship in young people. The Education Ministry was working with the secretariat for small business and the self-employed on a memorandum of understanding on measures to be taken for this to be brought about.

At the same time, the Employment and Training Corporation was working in the implementation of the National Employment Plan, offering a host of training programmes and schemes to help the jobless.

Parliamentary Secretary Edwin Vassallo said the Lisbon agenda was not perfect or complete, and would not lead the country anywhere automatically.

The Lisbon agenda, however, had to be made Malta's agenda because Malta's economy too needed to be dynamic and competitive.

Wherever the word Europe was mentioned in the agenda, it should be replaced with Malta.

The first challenge the country had was to make everyone accept the Lisbon agenda as their own. Everyone had a part to play and everyone should work in synergy of thought and attitude to facilitate business.

Malta could not stand still and remain isolated from reality. It needed to reform to become more competitive.

Knowledge and innovation should be the basis of this government's policy.

The country could not have authorities such as local councils that hindered business to try to give the impression that they were in charge.

Opposition speakers are being reported separately