I refer to Denis Tanti’s opinion piece ‘Culture of corruption’ (March 26). Tanti has every right to an opinion, but not to present skewed facts based on outright misinformation. For decorum’s sake, here are a number of facts which he conveniently did not put forward.

First off, it is not true that persons of trust hold administrative, managerial or technical positions but only non-executive ones. For truth’s sake, there has never been a clear and well-defined policy regulating persons of trust as there is nowadays. Current policy specifies their remuneration and their limits as defined by the Ministry for Finance.

Indeed, the policy is well-defined by the public service management code’s manual on resourcing policies and procedures (sections 1.13.9 and 4.7.1), which totally preclude the employment of persons of trust in positions mentioned by Tanti. These policies are public and can be found online https://publicservice.gov.mt/en/Pages/The%20Public%20Service/PSMC.aspx

Unlike Tanti’s attempt to give a different impression, the number of persons of trust currently engaged is totally at par with the number engaged under previous administrations, which contained less ministries.

Tanti also tried to obfuscate reality by giving the impression that prior to the 2017 general elections persons of trust saw their temporary engagement contract morphed into contracts for indefinite employment. The current administration has never approved a persons of trust contract into a definite employment contract with the government. Neither prior to the 2017 election, nor in its aftermath.

The government has never used different weights and measures with any particular union, nor was it discriminatory for that matter

Indeed, it was well prior to the actual announcement of the 2017 elections that definite contracts of employment of hundreds of government employees, appointed after a Public Service Commission selection process, were transposed into indefinite status so as to give their holders peace of mind on their employment.

Tanti must surely be very much aware that previous administrations, prior to an election, used to dish out favours by converting definite three-year contracts into indefinite ones, even despite the legitimacy of the selection process.

This administration did away with this dysfunctional system. Effectively, the new system did away with the discriminatory set-up whereby government employees, contrary to employment legislation, had to go through a three-year probationary period while their colleagues in other sectors only went through the customary maximum of 12 months.

It’s truly baffling that Tanti, a former assistant director in industrial and employment relations, did not see an iota of improvement in the new way of doing things in the public service. He repeatedly failed to check basic public facts right.

The Courts of Justice had found that [Mario] Cutajar was politically discriminated against, and that former high-level government officials were behind this political discrimination.

Tanti ignored the fact that the compensation was not the result of Cutajar having entered into discussions with government (a lie) but as a consequence of a decision of the Employment Commission whose members are appointed from both sides of the House and the current chairperson is agreed upon by both sides.

Conveniently, Tanti, who is very much accustomed to court procedures, was apparently unwilling to share with your readers these solid facts.

There are a number of permanent secretaries who, since the 1990s, were removed from office.

The law courts were very categorical in that there was nothing irregular or discriminatory in the 2013 appointment of new permanent secretaries. Indeed, Tanti can look up the sentence in the case which former permanent secretary Chris Ciantar made against the Prime Minister and the Principal Permanent Secretary.

Yet again, Tanti did not even manage to present your readers with correct facts when he referred to Sandro Camilleri. The latter was not seconded to the police union, but to the General Workers’ Union.

The government has never used different weights and measures with any particular union, nor was it discriminatory for that matter. Having government employees released on secondment with trade unions is a normal procedure that has been in effect since the 1990s.

Conveniently, Tanti failed to mention that both unions made an equal contribution in the negotiations which led to the first-ever collective agreement for the police corps.

I must say that it is bewildering, to say the least, that Tanti was not able to find absolutely anything positive to speak about the public service. It truly speaks volumes on the reasons as to why he tried to chastise the current head of the public service and present a number of disinformed assertions.

Paul Azzopardi is director, Department of Information.

This is a Times of Malta print opinion piece