Category: Archive – 2009

After GRTU and the other constituted bodies made pressure on the banks to be lenient with companies that are presently going through hard times as the recession overseas is being felt on our shores and the banks to our satisfaction started with relieving hotel owners on loan burdens, Government is going straight ahead in the opposite direction.

Today are not good tourist days for Malta and the many who depend on the tourism industry. One would therefore expect authorities to help these actors go through these difficult times and the times that are yet to come.

With this regard GRTU has written to Hon Janson Azzopardi, Parliamentary Secretary for Revenues and Land, saying that we have been informed by several members who are holders of encroachemnt permits issued by the Lands Department enabling them to keep tables and chairs outside their establishments that they have received a circular requesting them to submit a Bank Guarantee to the value of two hundred and fifty Euros (€250) per square metre of approved encroachment.

Such parties are already severely restricted by the conditions imposed upon them from time to time, which the GRTU is in favour of particularly in relation to the quality and uniformity of outdoor furniture as well as the prohibition of advertising on umbrellas and the prohibition from obstructing public passage ways.

However the aforementioned requirement being imposed is entirely prejudicial and contrary to the judicial procedures already established in Chapter 409 of the Laws of Malta in case of breaches of license conditions. The imposition of a Bank Guarantee which will be withdrawn unilaterally by the Malta Tourism Authority in the event of an alleged breach without the benefit of a fair trial before the competent forum is tantamount to a breach of the right of fair hearing afforded by Article 39 et seq of the Constitution of Malta.

Moreover this imposition is detrimental and discriminatory against the large percentage of permit holders who obey their license conditions impeccably and who are subsequently being forced to issue this additional financial burden.

In the light of the above the GRTU solicited the Parliamentary Secretary to take the necessary measures in order to withdraw forthwith the request for the provision of a Bank Guarantee in favour of the Malta Tourism Authority by holders of encroachemnt permits issued by the Lands Department.

GRTU has written this morning to the Minister for Transport Infrastructure and Communication Austin Gatt and to the Chairman of ADT to complain on the new speed cameras being introduced on the grounds that they are causing what we deem to be an unnecessary expense to distributors and other transport professionals who use the roads regularly.

GRTU insisted that high way code speed limits (85kph on main roads) and (55kph urban zones) should be adhered to. The current speed limits being imposed through the enforcement made by speed cameras infringe the speed limit rights vehicle owners have under the law. GRTU gave as an example that The Association of Chief Police Officers in the UK advised that under normal circumstances speed cameras should be triggered by motorists speeding by more than 10% + 2 miles per hour. Cameras will not normally be triggered below these trash holds. GRTU agrees with this advise and asked Minister Gatt to take it into consideration.

In addition, the locations are chosen not on safety grounds as they are praised on roads where it is safe to drive up to the national speed limits and they are not placed in sensitive zones such as school areas where this speed would constitute a danger to pedestrians. GRTU considers the locations chosen to install the speed cameras as literally highway robbery. The judgements made to install a speed camera do not follow criteria as those established inter alia by the British Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology's guidelines for the setting up of speed cameras. These guidelines include:

The majority (85%) of speed cameras must be placed in areas with a specified minimum level of death and injury within 1km in the previous 3 years (4 collisions) resulting in death/serious injury for fixed cameras, (2 for mobile)

Crashes would not have been speed related but it must be shown that speeding is a problem at the location 15% of enforcement time can be used to respond to emerging problems e.g. areas of local concern

Cameras should be clearly visible to motorists with yellow housings.

Vince Farrugia

 

We have become experts of the superlative. We're the best, we often read. On this, on that, or on the other. Or among the best. In practice these terms mean nothing unless they are placed in a proper context. Benchmarking really. What one can do is establish what is the standard for a certain activity and then compare with what is the acceptable and recognized standard.

 

In tourism we often read and hear many superlatives. One might think that the world should be grateful that we exist as no one can live without us. The truth is that if we take some standard measurements we quickly recognize how much we still need to do to improve our product and our performance. That is why it is so important to measure against the others, against the competitors. And in tourism they are all our competitors. Furthermore people have alternative uses for their money so the travel and tourism trade is competing against all others enticing us to spend our money on their product or service. More than that we're competing against all other countries. Internet has widened the market and multiplied the competition. People seek on the internet even the most exotic or strange country to travel to. So we can no longer sit tight and look only at the Mediterranean resorts as our competitors.

 

We need to stop thinking we are unique. We must look at where we stand in the competitiveness league. One great exercise on travel and tourism competitiveness is conducted yearly by the World Economic Forum. On 4^th March 2009 they will publish their Travel and Tourism Competitiveness Report 2009. It is worthwhile at this stage therefore to look at the various rankings and scores Malta obtained in the 2008 Report. After March we can then compare whether we made much progress. Not progress against ourselves, as journalists often do as they swallow the bait of those who publish statistics as interested parties, but progress against the rest in the market. The T&T Competitiveness Report has the input of all organizations that matter in the areas related to Tourism and they are authoritative  experts in their field: World Tourism Organisation; World Conservation Union; World Travel and Tourism Council; International Air Transport Association, and experts like Deliotte and Booz Allen Hamilton.

 

The Report uses special themes for each annual report. This year's special theme is environmental sustainability and it covers issues such as identifying useful mechanisms for inducing travel related emission reductions; the way the green strategies will change; how the tourism industry will operate in the future; and how environmental sustainability has more generally become a key driver of tourism competitiveness. The Report includes insightful contributions from a number of industry experts.

 

In the overall score among 130 economies examined Malta ranks 25^th. In establishing the ranking the TTCI Report tests 14 pillars of travel and tourism competitiveness.   These include policy and regulations; environment sustainability; safety and security; health and hygiene; air transport infrastructure; tourism infrastructure; human resources; natural resources and cultural resources.  And, of course, price competitiveness in the T&T Industry. But the emphasis is not on just price. Price is very important in tourism but increasingly less so since a price is for a product and unless the product is right the price is not so relevant.

 

The pillars are organized in three broad categories of variables that drive and facilitate tourism competitiveness: the regulatory framework; the business environmental for travel and tourism and the infrastructure; and the tourism human, cultural and natural resources. In practice three major influencing and deciding factors are measured: government involvement –  health security, environment sustainability, rules and enforcement prioritization of tourism; the business private sector element, including air transport, ground transport and handling, ICT infrastructure; tourism investments in hotels and infrastructure and of course price competitiveness; and the third sub index category includes the human and cultural elements of each country's resources endowments.

 

The report gives each country a score scale of one to seven and it is careful in what is measurable so that the figures become easily comparable. In 2008 Malta scored and ranked as follows:

 

Insert Graph Attached

 

Policy makers should give this Index a lot of importance and do all they can to get the whole tourism and travel sector to improve the scores. Government has a lot of influence in the first category group. Ranking 42^nd on environmental sustainability and 51^st on policy rules and regulations for example, is simply not good enough. Scoring high on safety and security, (12^th) and on health and hygiene (10^th) is commendable and should be emphasized more in our marketing. Our ranking on cultural resources is 30^th. This proves how right are the environment and culture pressure groups to keep insisting for greater awareness of our cultural heritage and the urgent need to invest more to protect and enhance what we have.

 

The private sector, in my view, should also make a much bigger effort. Ranking 34^th on ground transport infrastructure justifies fully Austin Gatt's determination to move fast on the track that leads us to an improved public transport service and to facilitate new and innovation infrastructural projects.

 

Ranking 19^th on the tourism infrastructure score also shows how much more we need to do. This score gives us the stimulus to act and take the opportunity to invest more.  A period of recession is a good time to review the infrastructure and to devote more resources to upgrade. We cannot just wait and hope the revival will come and everything goes back to what we assumed was a comfortable normality. We must act now to upgrade and seek new market niches through new investment both public and private. Government must ensure that the private sector has greater access to finance. Government should ensure that the Banks are more amenable, that we make full use of all funds made available under the EU Stimulus Package and that government entities do not force themselves on the  sector private  to squeeze entrepreneurs out of whatever capital they have available for investment.

 Ranking 32^nd on the ICT infrastructure agenda is also not acceptable. We have invested a lot in this field as a country and as private businesses. We need now to press on for more improvement. Believing as we do that we are the Smart Island should have given us a better ranking. But it's not just what we believe.

 

Of course the most shocking ranking is the 100^th position among 130^th other countries Malta tourism scores on price competitiveness. This is extremely serious. We must all put our heads together to start really cracking this hard nut. Price remains very important. The other elements grow to compensate price sector negatives but we cannot hide away from this one. It is a very bad ranking and we need to target action to resolve this price competitiveness issue.

 

The resources category sub-index also gives us stunning shocks. Overall 43^rd ranking for Malta is bad. This is one area where we have been used to the superlatives, for too long we have believed we are the fior del mondo, that we are among the very best. The truth is we are not and we must sweat to improve. Natural resources can improve with intelligent investments. Human resources should however be a prime target for improvement. This can improve in the short to medium term by a determined and strategic training programme. Natural resources are harder to improve but we also can if there is enough determination. What, for example, is stopping us from improving our beaches? Why do we have to kill off all projects that will give us new beaches, new golf courses, new nature reserves?  Ranking 129^th is incredible. We cannot really be that bad. This is an area where we need to act very carefully as it is the life-blood of tourism. And ranking 129^th among 130 cannot really be worse. Achieving a ranking of 30^th cultural resources is bad enough. Again this is an area were we can target improvements and draw action plans to achieve practical results.

 

Tourism needs a measured approach. It is too important for us. I am confident that Mario Demarco, Sam Mifsud and Josef Formosa Gauci, our top three on tourism policy and management,   believe in the measured approach. They deserve all our support as we must get this one right.  Tourism will always remain vital for us. Now is the time to act. We must measure against the competition. The short term immediate problems need to be tackled first: we must get more tourist coming and we need the airplane seats to get them and at the lowest price possible. But not this only. The Report clearly indicates that for tourism in Malta to remain sustainable and an important engine of economic growth we need to plan effective medium to long term action.

 

The European Commission has granted €30m to Malta and Sicily to be used in common sustainable projects and wind power over the next five years. The money will be further complimented by an additional € 5m to come out of the pockets of the Italian and Maltese Governments.

Calls for project proposals under the new fund will be issued in the coming months.

The Commission said the aim of the cross-border cooperation strategy 2007-2013 is to enhance and improve cooperation with regard to accessibility, innovation, and environment protection, development of natural and cultural resources and sharing of infrastructure and integrated services.

The European Parliament has overwhelmingly adopted a report which seeks an increase in ecommerce, particularly by demanding increased security and simplified rules for internet transactions.

The report, drafted by Greek MEP Georgios Papastamkos, was adopted by 562 votes in favour, 9 against and 10 abstentions.

Parliament noted that only 30 million EU citizens carry out cross-border online shopping in the EU, and established that the lack of trust in the security and safety of online transactions and payments "constitutes the most important danger for the future of ecommerce".

It therefore called on the Commission to investigate the causes, and to increase its efforts to strengthen trust in international electronic payment systems, as well as establishing means to resolve disputes relating to illegal commercial practices.

MEPs noted that these illegal practices, including counterfeiting and piracy, existed prior to the internet, but that the technology has "facilitated and exacerbated" these activities. Enforcement measures therefore needed to be strengthened in a way which would combat and possibly eliminate existing illegal behaviour online without hindering the development of international ecommerce.

Of particular concern to MEPs were cases liable to involve major risks to public health, such as counterfeit medicines.

The report also proposes a number of measures aimed to incentives SMEs to increase their ecommerce activities. It recommends that the Commission establishes a database to provide information and guidance to new and inexperienced participants in online training, and to conduct a comparative economic analysis on the benefits of online commerce and advertising for SMEs.

Source: di-ve.com

A kind friend of GRTU forwarded to us this "Unofficial Users Manual" following quite an ordeal he has been through in order to carry out the simple task of registering a vehicle he had imported. GRTU agrees and we find the process very time consuming and will be taking it up with the authorities so that a simple procedure is found.

Registering a vehicle is a simple and painless affair everywhere. Malta has, however, managed to trump the rest of the planet once again and turn a mindless procedure into an epic saga.

Below is a simple account that outlines all procedures, documentation and expected time-frames to help you through the operation should you ever need to or want to import a car.

This guide assumes you have purchased a non-commercial vehicle within the EU (UK, for instance) and that it has been shipped/driven to Malta.    

STEP 1

Within 5 days of arrival of the vehicle you must inform the authorities of your intentions. To do so you need to take the necessary documentation to ADT for them to 'open the file'. Remember that you will be getting none of the documents back but will need copies of them for future steps so do copy EVERYTHING you pass on to ADT.    

Locate the right queue at ADT and present the following: 

Original logbook

Notice of Arrival (shipping document that proves importation)

Signed Invoice/proof of purchase

Photocopy of the front of your ID card (Even if it's expired they still need it)

Two forms filled out and signed. Form 1 is used to calculate the registration tax and Form 2 will allow you to specify size/nature of number plates.

To download the forms outlined in point 5 use the following links: 

http://www.maltatransport.com/en/doc/VEH01.pdf

http://www.maltatransport.com/en/doc/VEH02.pdf    

If all is found in order, you will be given a little slip of paper with an appointment for your vehicle's inspection.

STEP 2

On the day and time (all appointments seem to be at 7:30 so do be there well before) of your inspection appointment. All you will need is the appointment slip. You have to drive the car with foreign number plates to Floriana so make sure the vehicle is insured and that you have the appointment slip with you for potential run-ins with the authority on your way.

Your 'file' should have made it to the inspection area, located 30 metres away from Hall B, right next to the area allocated to driving tests. If your file hasn't been transferred you have to explain this to the person who issued your appointment on Day 1. Allow an extra 1hr 30 mins if this is the case. An official will compare the engine number and chassis number of the vehicle to those on its logbook. If all is in line, you may now drive back home.

There is nothing more you can do at this point because the file will only be transferred back to Hall B the following day. This is your last chance to take your vehicle for a VRT so if you haven't already, make sure you do so.   

STEP 3

With your vehicle safely inside a garage remover the foreign number plates.

You will need:

1. The original (foreign) number plates. 

2. A certificate of insurance that covers the period until the expiry of the road license. In the case of non-personalised plates, this means 12 months. 

3. A bank draft or cash to cover the full amount of registration tax as calculated on http://vehicleregistration.gov.mt.

They will NOT accept a personal cheque and bank cards are occasionally subject to purchase limits below that required for registration tax. 

4. A print-out of the page on http://vehicleregistration.gov.mt where you've calculated the tax value. 

5. A VRT certificate 6. A photocopy of the original Logbook

7. Your cheque book or a decent amount of cash.

Take all of these to Hall B once again and queue in the appropriate place (all the way to the left of the entrance).

When your turn arrives, present all the necessary papers (and number plates) and the registration tax will be calculated again. You will also have to pass on a cheque/cash to cover road license and number plates.

Once all is ready, queue again to be given a receipt for all payments and at this point you will be asked to leave your name and number. Here you will be given a sheet of paper with a batch number on it. You will NOT leave with the new number plates and a logbook but must wait for ADT to call you once they've sorted it all out – a week at the very least.

At this point you can NOT drive your car so do not drive to ADT with the new vehicle since you'll have to drive back home without number plates.    

STEP 4

ADT will call once they've processed all the paperwork. There could be a discrepancy between the amount paid in STEP 3 and the final calculation. You should be told about this over the phone but do take your cheque book with you once again.

You MUST present the sheet of paper with a batch number that was provided in STEP 3. Queue at the leftmost counter and present the batch number. Provided there is no additional payment to be made, you will finally have your new logbook and number plates.

Remember that the entire process will take at least two weeks so don't plan or depend on using your new vehicle before that. Going to ADT with any required document missing will further lengthen the process so do make sure you have everything necessary at every step.

Tomorrow, Thursday 26 February 2009

Palace Hotel Sliema

This Seminar is planned to help you, your family, your business and your employees. It is also meant to protect and improve your financial wellbeing during 2009.

Prior registration with Carmen Borg on 79370730 or

   GRTU has today sent its comments after being consulted by the   Food Safety Commission on the possible introduction of a Legal Notice regulating the Slaughtering of Rabbits for Human Use for Units Rearing 49 does or less.

After having analysed the proposed Legal Notice that the Food Safety Commission is in the process of advising to the relevant Ministers to issue, GRTU finds itself not in agreement with the changes being proposed in the Legal Notice.This Legal Notice proposes to regulate against slaughtering of rabbits on a very small scale. The operators affected are currently unregulated, for the precise reason of being small. Practices such as the slaughter in one’s shop will not be admissible unless the requirements have been met, in real terms however GRTU is not aware of any such practices.

It will however affect the cottage industry, leading to a total halt of this industry since the operators will not be able to sustain the costs involved to be in line with the requirements of the proposed Legal Notice. GRTU is not in agreement in this context and doubts the reasons the Legal Notice is being proposed.

GRTU is principally not in agreement since we do not see any requirement for this Legal Notice being imposed by a European Directive. Going beyond the Directive means that other Member States are not imposing such a burden and it is therefore unfair for these micro operators to carry a burden they cannot sustain, which their fellow operators in other Member States do not have to face. This proposal therefore goes against European principles within the Better Regulation Strategy and the Small Business Act, both of which the Government has endorsed during European Council Meetings. Within the principles endorsed is the “Think Small First” principle which means policies should be made with the micro and small operators in mind, a principle which this Legal Notice clearly lacks.  As a conclusion GRTU therefore reiterated that it disagrees with the adoption of this Legal Notice and we invite the Food Safety Commission to withdraw such proposal for the reasons stated above. Should any members be interested in more information, please do not hesitate to contact Abigail Mamo.

Government has recently announced the launch of a €10 million scheme investment in energy-efficiency measures and renewable energy sources confined by the EU European Regional and Development Fund (ERDF) and the Government.

The funds are available to all enterprises and are meant primarily to improve energy efficiency, an important element in ensuring environmental protection as well as a key component of business stability.

The energy grants will be accessible through a competitive call through a competitive call that will be administered by Malta Enterprise.

Through this scheme 2 types of investments will be supported:

Energy Saving Measures

Installation of intelligent lighting systems

Solar heating

Thermal insulation

Building management systems and energy saving lightings

2. Alternative Energy Sources

Installation of energy generating solutions based on the use of solar power and wind power Projects benefiting from this incentive should be completed within 18 months and have a minimum value of € 25,000.

Also recently launched is the Energy Audits through which enterprises can identify effective ways of reducing costs of energy consumption. Businesses can apply with Malta Enterprise for an Energy Audit and a qualified expert will be sent to the applying company to conduct a walkthrough energy audit and identify opportunities for energy saving.

This incentive is fully funded by Malta Enterprise. The numbers of audit hours are pre-determined by Malta Enterprise depending on the size and complexity of the applying enterprise. The report generated can then assist the enterprises to submit a well balanced application for the ERDF Energy Grants.