MEA returns to MCESD table as a ‘sign of goodwill’

The Malta Employers Association (MEA) has ‘waivered’ it’s announced boycott of the Malta Council for Economic and Social Development (MCESD) has returned to the council table in what MEA President Pierre Fava described as “a sign of goodwill.”

MaltaToday is informed that the MEA decided to return to the MCESD after it engaged in talks with government over the controversial appointment of GRTU boss Vince Farrugia to the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC).

The appointment had irked the MEA, leading the association to lambast government and declare a boycott on all for a.

MEA’s absence from such a forum risked crippling government’s  plans to seek general approval of its 2011 Budget programme, that is expected to be announced on the first week of November.

While government has reportedly set three dates during October to meet with all social partners  to discuss Budget matters, unions are at loggerheads with employers as they upped their pressure to have changes done to the Cost of Living Adjustment (COLA).

Trade unions are insisting that COLA should not be touched in any circumstance, even if exceptional, as the employers are requesting.

Social partners are meanwhile studying the contents of a draft bill that was prepared by government and provides for the setting up of Consumer Malta.

The 120 page draft is expected to be tabled in the House by Finance Minister Tonio Fenech during his Budget speech, but comes a year later he announced the setting up of such an agency after a problematic 2009 where inflation is concerned.