Opposition views ETC figures as 'misleading'

Opposition employment spokesman Karl Chircop said yesterday that figures being issued by the Employment and Training Corporation was misleading.

He said during the first day of the ETC debate in Parliament that while the ETC was saying that unemployment was down , figures issued by the National Statistics Office on the basis of the Labour Force Survey showed that unemployment grew by 1,000 in a year.

It was about time, Dr Chircop said, that the government, as in other EU countries, gave primary importance to the Labour Force Survey.

He also complained that the unemployed were being struck off the register on th pittiest of pretexts and had to re-register. Dr Chircop observed that part-time employment had risen by 3,571. Labour was not against labour force flexibility but part-time employment could not be abusively used to distort the employment figures. The ETC had the role to analyse and create solutions for job creation, but what was happening was that part-time jobs were being used to give the impression that more people were working.

In order for job creation to come about, the government needed to stimulate the economy. GDP growth projections for next year, at 1.1 per cent, placed Malta at the bottom end of the EU figures and nowhere near that of, say Cyprus, one of Malta's direct competitors for foreign investment and tourism. These were all signs that Malta was not managing to overcome the challenges of globalisation. Malta had one of the highest debt to GDP ratios in the EU and the deficit remained high.

Dr Chircop said it was worrying that a growing number of youngsters were getting so discouraged, that they were not even bothering to register for work. The ETC figures showed that the number of long-term unemployed had decreased by 37 per cent, but this too was suspect in view of the strike-offs.

How could one tolerate a situation where long-term unemployed people were struck off because they failed to sign the register just once? Sometimes people were struck off at the end of the month and then, when the figures were compiled less people appeared on the register.

Dr Chircop said the ETC now had to see how it could deal with the possible laying off of hundreds of workers in the textiles sector.

Dr Chircop criticised the government for having failed to raise the workers' participation rate, particularly the participation rate of women. The main reason for the situation was that there were too few jobs for women, Dr Chircop said.

How could the participation rate rise when job opportunities were few?

The government had announced in the budget that it would raise assistance for child care centres, but this assistance was still not enough.

Turning to the ETC's employment services section, Dr Chircop observed that while the ETC was saying that there were over 4,000 job placements last year, the reply to a recent parliamentary question said there had been 2,000 job placements.

Moreover, placements with the public services had increased from some 500 last year to some 1,500 this year.

Dr Chircop said the number of work permits given to foreigners appeared to be high. He hoped this was not due to some racket where ETC workers were issuing such permits irregularly.

He also called for an overhaul of the ETC's training services to ensure that training matched the demands of industry.

The Labour MP urged the corporation to be prompt in its payment of training grants, saying that Lm402,000 were currently owed.