News
The truth about Air Malta
In an interview titled A fine balancing act, published in The Sunday Times of the 25th of July 2010, the Honourable Finance Minister Tonio Fenech made certain statements that merit to be rectified for the benefit of the readers, particularly to those parts where the Minister referred to Air Malta.
Definitely, the GWU cannot deny the Minister his right to hold an opinion or to have a vision how things should and could be conducted. Nevertheless, the GWU cannot agree with incorrect and inaccurate statements that are purposely made to justify and sustain an argument, as the Honourable Tonio Fenech did during the interview.
In this context, one concludes that the Minister Fenech is either misinformed or is being intentionally misguided. As a matter of fact, the issue of overtime work within Air Malta and how this matter is tackled at the Company is very far from what Minister Fenech portrayed them to be.
If the Finance Minister really wants to know the facts he can easily verify them by simply consulting the Company’s management. Today, the ground handling staff duties are carried out in the most flexible manner and organised in a way that gives the Company the option not to resort to overtime work. Therefore, the assertion that “when a flight has excess baggage for the number of ground handling staff on a particular shift – normally made up of seven workers – and the company needs one extra worker it cannot simply call up one worker but it would have to call up a group of seven”, is completely unfounded to say the least.
While no one disputes the fact that the financial situation of Air Malta is overwhelming and is a matter of concern, equally, no one should put the blame on the workers for the creation of such an unpleasant state of affairs. The Minister surely knows that the price Air Malta is paying for fuel is one thing. Adding to that, the GWU reiterates that the present precarious financial situation is a consequence of erroneous decision foremost the purchasing of the RJ fleet that literally shattered Air Malta and brought it on its knees, the setting up of Azzura Air, and more gravely the excess of politically motivated jobs that were given in the last 20 years
Notwithstanding, this situation do not justify that Air Malta be privatised. It has to be kept in mind that various public entities, Air Malta included, have for a long period of time operated profitably and benefited the national economy and the Maltese people at large.
Surely, the GWU agrees that it is bad politics when governments offer their boys jobs in public companies and corporations. The Maltese people do not elect governments to do such things. To the contrary, the people’s representatives are elected not only to see but also to ensure that public entities are run efficiently and successfully.
Moreover, if the government is thinking that precarious work and the undermining of working conditions make an entity profitable, the GWU unequivocally declares that it does not concur with such policies. Air Malta employees have already been subjected to carry the brunt of the harsh sacrifices that were embedded in the Memorandum of Understanding. As a matter of fact, the GWU had for several times complained and drew the attention to the situation where subcontractors carrying out particular work within Air Malta are employing workers with miserable conditions.
Finally, the GWU strongly maintains that the reasoning that an entity has to be privately owned to be profitable is not only fallacious but also illogical. In this context, if the Government’s thought is to privatise Air Malta under one excuse or another, it will only be contradicting itself considering the various public statements that Air Malta is an important asset to the Maltese economy.