Up to 25,000 women suffer domestic violence

The Malta Confederation of Womens’ Organisations said that up to one in four women in Malta has experienced domestic violence. A  more "worrying fact is that only 50% of women enduring domsetic violence seek help, while over one third of research respondents believe that domestic violence should be kept within the confines of the family."

The MCWO welcomes the call made by Dolores Cristina, asking for submissions on amendments to the 2006 law on domestic violence, which gives heavy weighting to the victim's evidence and disregards alternative evidence if the victim refuses to testify. Laiveria states that the message this gives to the agressor is that if his victim is frightened enough he can get away with anything. 

The MCWO said it was celebrating 100 years since the founding of international women’s day, but Malta was still lagging behind on equality in public and political participation and labour market conditions.

Laiviera said that according to the Gender Balance in Business Leadership Report published by the EU, Malta was still at the bottom of EU rankings with only 2% female business leaders as opposed to the EU average of 12%. Sweden and Finland placed highest with 26%.

Female participation in parliament is equally low, at just 9% compared to an EU average of 24%. Liaviera quoted the vice president of the European Commission Viviane Reding as calling for business leaders to address the lack of business leaders in European Boardrooms , referring to Norway, France and Spain as having introduced regulatory intervention, adopting legislation which states 40% of boadroom members must be female. 

Reding said "Enhancing women's participation in boardrooms can make companies more profitable and trigger sustainable economic growth."

She also said that despite a 60% female ration of computer graduates, the Maltese labour market had just 39% of female workers, many of whom dropped out of work at the age of 34 because of childbearing and childrearing priorities, as child care and before and after school facilities are lacking. 

Laiviera added that according to a National Commission of Promotion of Equality (NCPE) survey women had to work an extra two months a year to be at par with men on labour rates. “There is a 23% difference between a man’s and woman’s salary, because women tend to work in services and very few of them work in engineering, management or computing where salaries are much higher.” An EU average of 17.5% gender gap in salaries has been consistent throughout EU member countries for the past 15 years.