Ministers to retain €19,000 salary and refund €14,000 from increased 'honoraria'

Updated and revised at 7:24pm.

Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi has officially announced that ministers will be refunding some €14,000 in increased honoraria they were paid since May 2008. They will retain a €19,000 honorarium they are paid as MPs every year, and refund the extra money they were paid as part of an 'increased' honorarium of €26,000 they were being paid in the past two years.

Gonzi told parliament tonight that various changes in MPs’ honoraria had taken place over the years, among them allowing civil servants elected to parliament to retain their government employment while being paid their honoraria.

“This injustice was rectified in 2004 and allowed civil servants to retain their employment and be treated the same way as MPs who had private employment,” Gonzi said in a preamble to announcing the refunds.

The PM said that after the 2008 election, the government felt the same yardstick should apply to ministers, who as government employees should also retain their honoraria as MPs when previously they did not.

Gonzi also said honoraria for Maltese MPs were amongst the lowest in Europe, surpassing just those of Lithuania and Bulgaria. He added that he had told the Sunday Times in an interview that he believed ministers should retain their honoraria as MPs since they also attend parliament and that it was time to review the honoraria.

Gonzi referred to medical consultants elected to Parliament – there are three such MPs – who retained salaries as government employees that were higher than government ministers'.

“Had they been ministers before 2008, they would have been expected to accept a lower minister’s salary and of course be unable to retain their private work, if any.”

Gonzi said that discussions in the parliament’s welfare committee and recent discussions with the Opposition on allowances for MPs also had the “agreement” of the Opposition.

“I am informed there was agreement with the Opposition on the allowances payable to MPs, and that I was also asked by the Oppposition to effect these allowances.”

Gonzi said the new allowance package would now be suspended and be discussed in the parliament’s house business committee, for a decision to be taken by the end of the month.

But Opposition leader Joseph Muscat, in his counter-reply, denied ever having given any “indications” of his agreement on the increase in honoraria for MPs.

He accused the Prime Minister of being in contempt of parliament, echoing similar accusations by Labour whip Joe Mizzi and Alfred Sant, for demanding MPs to “come to an agreement in the house business committee” by the end of the month.

“The Prime Minister is making this announcement 30 months too late. Nothing has changed from the fact that ministers will be pocketing two salaries. This decision is only down to the fact that the prime minister is scared of losing votes.”

Muscat also took Gonzi to task for taking a Cabinet decision without ever informing him as Opposition leader on changes to his salary. He insisted that the Opposition never agreed with the increases and that it was unacceptable that in successive Budgets, the House voted on ministerial emoluments which did not reflect the actual financial package of the prime minister and the ministers. “You cannot call this a parliamentary honoraria when the money is being paid straight out of the ministerial vote,” Muscat said.

In a long-winded reply to questions by Muscat, Gonzi said he had previously hoped both sides would have discussed changes to MPs' allowances in the select committee for the strengthening of democracy, but which were never raised by former Speaker of the House Louis Galea.

In a Freudian slip, he said the press - without referring specifically to MaltaToday's front-page report on 30 November 2008 - had "caught us out" (qabduna) when arguing that the decision was already known. "They got our picture and the salary increase in large numbers... you cannot tell us you didn't know," he told the Opposition leader.

SEE MaltaToday front page of 30 November 2008