Category: Archive – 2012

Credit cards:
Visa declined to give commitments on the rates for consumer credit cards and
only agreed to the 0.2% rate for debit. The SSO therefore takes the preliminary
view that Visa's credit card MIFs are contrary to competition law, following
the same arguments as those in the MasterCard case.

Cross-border
acquiring: the Commission's preliminary view is tha
Visa's rules on cross-border acquiring also breach the antitrust rules and stop
merchants benefiting from lower MIFs in other member states.

GRTU
considers this is very good news, which we have been expecting for some time.
Following the judgement in MasterCard, we certainly anticipate a favourable
outcome.

The European Commission has informed
Visa of additional concerns about possible violations of EU antitrust rules
concerning multilateral interchange fees (MIFs) set by Visa. The so-called
'supplementary statement of objections' (SSO) relates to MIFsset by Visa for
transactions with consumer credit cards in the European Economic Area (EEA).
MIFs are an important part of the total cost that retailers must pay for
accepting Visa's consumer payment cards and establish a minimum price for
retailers.

The Commission's preliminary view is that
these MIFs restrict competition between banks and infringe EU antitrust rules
that prohibit cartels and restrictive business practices. At this stage, the
Commission also doubts that Visa's MIFs are necessary to create efficiencies
that benefit merchants and consumers and could therefore be entitled to an
exception from these rules. The sending of a supplementary statement of
objections does not prejudge the outcome of the investigation.

Today's SSO concerns all MIFs set
directly by Visa in the EEA for transactions with consumer credit cards. These
MIFs currently apply to all cross-border transactions in the EEA, as well as
to domestic transactions in eight EU Member States (Belgium, Hungary,
Ireland, Italy, Luxemburg, Malta, The Netherlands and Sweden). These inter-bank
fees are paid by merchants' banks (acquirers) to cardholders' banks (issuers)
for transactions with Visa's consumer credit cards.

The Commission has reached the
preliminary conclusion that MIFs reduce price competition between banks by creating
an important cost element common to all acquirers. The Commission considers
that Visa's MIFs harm competition between acquiring banks, inflate the cost of
payment card acceptance for merchants and ultimately increase consumer prices.
The Commission's analysis follows closely the judgment of the EU General Court
of May 2012 in the MasterCard case, which fully upheld the Commission's
findings in this respect.

Further, the Commission considers at
this stage that the MIFs' contribution to technical and economic progress,
which could justify an exemption under Article 101(3) of the Treaty on the
Functioning of the European Union (TFEU) has not been proven. Even if this were
the case, the Commission considers that the Visa MIFs are not set in a way that
would allow consumers to enjoy a fair share of such benefits.
Moreover, the actual Visa MIFs do not appear to be indispensable to
the attainment of the efficiencies claimed.

In addition, the Commission holds the
preliminary view that rules obliging cross-border acquirers to pay MIFs
applicable in the country of transaction hinder cross-border acquiring and
maintain the segmentation of national markets. The Commission considers that
this breaches EU antitrust rules and prevents merchants from benefiting from
lower MIFs in other Member States.

Background

Visa's credit and debit cards represent
approximately 41% of all payment cards issued in the EEA. Visa has the largest
acceptance network within the EEA with over 5 million merchants accepting its
payment cards. In 2010 a total of 35 billion card payments were made in the
EEA, with a total value of €1800 billion.

Following the opening of proceedings in
March 2008, the Commission sent Visa in April 2009 a Statement of Objections
concerning multilateral interchange fees ("MIFs") for consumer debit
and credit card transactions. Visa Europe offered commitments to cap its debit
card MIFs at 0.20%, which the Commission made binding in December 2010. The
proceedings regarding consumer credit MIFs continued.

Article 101 of the Treaty on the
Functioning of the EU (TFEU) andArticle 53 of the EEA Agreement prohibit
cartels and restrictive business practices. Article 101(3) TFEU allows certain
practices to be exempted from this prohibition on condition that they improve
production or distribution or contribute to technical or economic progress,
provided that a fair share of the benefits are passed on to consumers, and that
the practices are proportionate and do not eliminate competition.

According to European Environment
Agency, several EU Member States missed the 2010 limits to green-house
emissions. Transport is responsible for a large
share of urban air pollution. Road freight vehicles in an urban environment
usually emit a greater proportion of certain pollutants per kilometre than
other motor vehicles such as cars and motorcycles, and their fuel consumption
is higher per unit of distance travelled besides the fact that many of them use
high-carbon intensive fuel.

This year the number of motor vehicles
in Malta went up by 2.4 % compared to 2011 reaching a fleet of 313,027 units,
of which 13% is represented by freight vehicles.

Moreover, the country currently has the
5th highest number of vehicles per capita in the world, with 743 motor vehicles
per 1,000 people, causing major congestion problems at peak times, especially
in the areas with the highest population and trade density such as Marsa,
Birkirkara, Luqa and Qormi.

Malta, as many other EU Countries, is
facing major barriers to implement sustainable energy measures, aimed in
particular at an efficient freight distribution and transport management. Even
where there is a strong commitment to improve efficiency levels, cities often
lack the needed information, supportive national level policies, access to
financing, etc.

There is considerable consensus that
improving the energy efficiency of passenger/goods transport is a key challenge
in moving towards a more sustainable energy future. But meeting such a
challenge requires an evidence-based approach.

The C-Liege Project (Clean Last Mile
Transport and Logistics Management for Smart and Efficient Local Governments in
Europe) has been developed with the aim to set criteria for assessing and
improving the sustainability of transport policies promoting energy efficient
and cleaner freight movements in urban areas, providing a novel set of
integrated solutions and applying a mix of "push & pull" measures
to city time slots/space allocation. The Project is co-funded by the
Intelligent Energy Europe Programme.

Malta is one of the seven EU pilot
sites and the Maltese consortium's partner, Paragon Europe, is committed to get
Local Authorities and other key stakeholders involved in the process to discuss
and finally introduce and implement transport measures already deployed in
other EU cities. This process started with the organization of two Round Table
meetings in Attard, where Paragon Europe invited the Local Councils of Tarxien,
Marsa, Luqa, Birzebbuga and Safi, together with other relevant organizations
(Traffic Police, the University of Malta) and private Businesses (Valletta
Gateway Terminals, shippers and freight operators).

The discussions brought to the
attention the major problems affecting the freight transport sector and their
causes, such as high number of second hand freight vehicles, double space
parking due to lack of unloading bays, no alternative delivery systems, absence
of Freight Quality Partnerships, minimal usage of environmentally friendly
vehicles and time restrictions in Custom Offices in Malta, which run on
government based hours and run until 4pm in Winter and 1pm in Summer.

Successively, the attendees identified
some good measures that could alleviate the traffic congestion in the urban
areas, such as fiscal
incentives to vehicles' replacement, Environmental Zones, Heavy
cargo ban during rush hours and night
delivery. Some Local Councils present committed themselves to discuss these
policies and create a preferential path for their implementation.

Paragon Europe and its Maltese partners
are convinced that such measures can support the Government's efforts in
reducing and better managing freight transport issues within the Maltese urban
centres.

New Cohesion
funds 2014 – 2020 coming up! – The information session on Cohesion
Policy 2014-2020 was organised by MEUSAC. In his introduction DrVanniXuereb,
Head MEUSAC, stated that Cohesion Policy is essential for the functioning of
the EU also because it aims at bridging the gap between high income and lower
income countries. Cohesion funds create a lot of work and employment
opportunities through infrastructure and social projects. The current funding
period will come to a close in 2013 and we have started thinking and preparing
for the next funding period, starting 2014.

The presentation was delivered by
Planning and Priorities Coordination Division's (PPCD) EU funds Coordination
Director Maria Pia Pace. This relatively new unit within PPCD  works primarily on policy, amongst which is
Cohesion Policy. Ms Pace outlined that a third of the EU Budget is allocated to
Cohesion Policy, a total of €376B.

Fund allocation to the countries will
be divided between 3 categories, according to the level of development, where
the least developed regions would benefit from higher amounts of funding. Malta
will classify for less funding compared to the least developed regions since it
was categorised as a transition region. Malta however will also have a ‘safety
net' because it will still be given two thirds of the previous funding
programme's financial allocation.

The EU has already issued guidelines in
the form of thematic concentrations where funding should be targeted, these to
help the EU and the Member States reach the targets set in the Europe 2020
strategy and the national reform programmes. Member States therefore are up to
a certain extent obliged to allocate funds to the outlined thematic
concentrations. The 5 targets of the EU 2020 strategy are: Employment, Climate
Change, Education and Reduction of Poverty.

Currently discussions are undergoing
and negotiations will be concluded by end 2013, with the Operational
Programmesfinalised by the 1st quarter of 2014.

Present for the meeting the GRTU stated
that the employment schemes under the current funding period where critical to
sustaining our employment levels and the next programming period should include
further incentives for enterprises to invest in their workforce. GRTU however
outlined that a problem found within the current funding period should be
addressed in view of the next. A significant number of enterprises were
surprised that they could not benefit because for instance within their
partner's company, which was totally independent and within a different sector,
there had been a redundancy. It is in fact a requirement set by the EU that
companies having had recent redundancies cannot benefit from employment
schemes. Different companies having a common shareholder or partner are
regarded as one company. GRTU argued that being a small country it was very
common for companies to have common shareholders and partners. GRTU therefore
told the PPCD that Malta's case is particular and our case should be argued to
exempt Malta from such a requirement.

GRTU National Executive Council has
this week met Hon Jason Azzopardi, Minister for fair competition, small
businesses and consumers, to discuss important current issues, primarily the
new Collective Proceedings Act. GRTU was very pleased to welcome Dr
Azzopardi, who was accompanied by Permanent Secretary Paul Zahra and Personal
Assistant to the Minister Lino Mintoff.

GRTU's Director General Vincent
Farrugia told the Minister that even though a single meeting had taken place
during which the Collective Proceedings Act was introduced GRTU had expected
that a number of further discussion meetings would have been held and that such
an important topic would have been discussed at Enterprise Consultative Council
level and maybe even MCESD. This also in line with the way a serious
consultation is carried out and according to the EU guidelines on an effective
and transparent consultation process. At EU level such an initiative is
commonly referred to as Collective Redress, which is a great bone of
contention. Following a Green Paper in 2008, the Commission has so far only consulted
stakeholders. That is another reason as to why GRTU was so surprised the
legislative action was taken so fast in Malta.

The Director General stated that GRTU
is however pleased that during the basic form of consultation carried out GRTU
had aired its views and several aspects were taken on board. GRTU presented Hon
Azzopardi with a paper emphasizing important aspects that still need to be
taken into consideration especially in the implementation of the Act.

In brief GRTU argued that:

Particular attention should be given to product
liability as this is already creating substantial confusion

It should be ensured that companies are safeguarded
from long term negative effects. During a class action companies that have not
yet been proven guilty should be safeguarded from being given a bad name

The mechanisms for alternative dispute resolution
should be strengthened and preferred to a collective action when more
appropriate and possible

The introduction of safeguards such as the loser pays
principle, no punitive damages, qualified experts, etc…

Public funding for collective redress cases is
absolutely unacceptable. Financial support to consumers and information
campaigns about potential violations of a business to attract more claimants
violates the principles of party equality

GRTU emphasised that it is absolutely
not acceptable that the private sector is once again being discriminated with
regards to payments. It is unacceptable that Consumer associations are exempt
form the payment of court registry fees and that in the event the court decides
against the consumer association, the court would reduce the registry fees
against the association by between one tenth and one half according to its
economic standing. This is blatant discrimination and unequal treatment in a
court.

GRTU also took the opportunity of
having with us Hon Azzopardi and Perm Sec Zahra to also raise the issue once
again of bureaucratic burdens emanating form public administration. GRTU once
again called for a transparent and accountable system to be introduced which
includes the publication of the Legal Notice Checklists and the involvement of
the MEU when policies are drafted to ensure that we do not continue adding to
the already unsustainable mountain of burdens.

Another issue the GRTU raised was on
the Rent Reform. GRTU argued once again, and Hon Azzopardi rightly agreed with
most arguments presented by the GRTU, that it is highly unjust and in breach of
basic human rights that legally standing contracts are just made null and
changed by an abusing third party, Government. GRTU made its position clear
once again that GRTU is waiting for Government to turn around and make amends
to the legislative wrongs done to enterprise. GRTU will before the end of the
year otherwise take legal action which will be made stronger with the newly
created Collective Proceedings Act where GRTU will appear for its members hit
by the reform against Government.

GRTU takes this opportunity to thank
Hon Azzopardi for meeting the GRTU National Executive Council and open for
discussions on the topics presented by the GRTU. Hon Azzopardi immediately
showed interest to meet the GRTU once again next month and therefore another
dialogue meeting to discuss important topics for enterprise will be held in
September.

Green MT, the National Authorized
Packaging Waste Compliance Scheme, continues with its aggressive public
awareness campaign through the placement of billboards in a number of prominent
major roads in Malta. The billboard shows material fractions namely, metal,
plastic, paper and glass accompanied by the statement ‘We are not Rubbish".
This billboard campaign has also included two familiar faces, that of Gable
(Deceduti) character, who is now avidly recycling with Maltese Prolific songwriter
and singer Kristina Casolani. Both awareness spots can be seen at University
roundabout.

Additionally, Green MT has continued
its radio jingle campaign on one of the leading Radio Stations in Malta, Bay
89.7.. This campaign will continue on other radio stations in the coming
months.

Green MT, operates the largest recovery
of recyclable materials in Malta and Gozo with collections reaching over 240
tons a week.  This logistical operation
is provided by services outfarmed to waste carriers who are Green MT accredited
contractors. The Scheme provides Waste Packaging Compliance to over 1400
producer members year after year. Over the last three years, July 2009 to June
2012, Green MT has recovered over 38,000 tons of recyclable material from Local
Councils, Bring in Sites and also Commercial establishments, including the
hospitality industry.

The public in many Local Councils and
beyond are the driving force of our collections and we duly thank all those who
have over the last three years separated waste and made sure that it is no
longer considered waste but a resource. Our initiatives at Local Council level
continue to place Green MT as the largest Packaging Waste Compliance Scheme on
the island.

Green MT, a fully owned subsidiary of the GRTU Malta Chamber
of Small and Medium Enterprises has been at the forefront of making sure that
environmental legislation is in place in accordance with European Directives.
This has not stopped, and to date we are still providing our best proposals to
Government to make sure that a fair and level playing field all round is put in
place for both producers, brokers and waste management facilities.

The public has been pretty well
confused by a spate of published statistics that have been presented rather
awkwardly. It started with the inflation figures that had the media and the
opposition screaming loud that inflation in Malta is 4.4%. This figure is
wrong! The Retail Price Index was published at the end of July and the annual
inflation rate for Malta is 2.4%. This is not a figure worth raising our heads
from under the umbrellas by the beach in the heath of August!

Then again a confusingly written
government press release was somehow understood to mean that unemployment in
Malta has reached the level of 7.8% of the labour force. With a presumable 4.4%
inflation rate and a 7.8% unemployment rate our economy would have been in dire
straits. These are definitely incorrect statements.

The real unemployment rate is 4.4%. An unemployment rate of
4.4% and an inflation rate of 2.4% is more than acceptable for an economy as
open as Malta's and for an economy so dependent as Malta is on the
international economic situation. This is also very acceptable given the
current state of economic affairs in most of the countries with whom we do most
business.

GRTU has for too long lobbied, both at
national level and in Brussels, for the creation of special Project Bonds to
finance specific development projects. The money is available and the Maltese
have proven on too many occasions that they are willing to invest in Government
promoted projects. The Valletta special project financing, recently
oversubscribed, proved that the public has the funds and the trusts necessary
to finance special projects.

This is one way forward to create new
jobs and continue to invest in the transformation of our national economy.
Malta needs a greater and faster leap forward in economic development and
transformation though innovation. The new economic contributors to Malta's
successful new economy, all knowledge based sectors, enjoy rates of productivity more than
double the average national productivity rate. The older sectors of the economy
like construction, retail and wholesale, accommodation, public administration
and real estate have productivity rates as low as 50% of the national average
and not higher than 75% if the national average.

"The
new knowledge based sectors in which modern Malta of the last ten years has
invested so successfully enjoyed productivity rates of up to 200% of the
national average productivity rates. The new positive high productivity sectors
include Financial Services, Information Communication, Entertainment and
recreation, including e-gaming and other e-activities. We now need more of the
new and more within the old to make them renewed and upgraded. The financing
needs to be addressed towards the new Malta, new Project Bonds, should provide
the necessary stimulus" emphasised Vincent Farrugia Director General of
GRTU.

"We do not need
funding of unnecessary, unproductive and environmentally intrusive projects,
but funding for projects that give us a new impetus for growth and increased
economic value added. We need to upgrade the old or replace with new quality
investments leading to greater value" reported Vincent Farrugia in
an economic report to GRTU's National Executive Council.

GRTU has officially
requested the honourable Chris Said, Minister for Justice, Dialogue and the
Family, to give answers to the following questions: The amount of
prison inmates that are serving timedue to VAT related offences of any
nature as at end July 2012;

The amount of
time that VAT offenders have spentserving time since the enactment of the
VAT Act; A breakdown of
whether those serving time emanate from the business community or the public in
general; The amount of
time that current inmates serving time due to VAT offences have to serve beyond
end July 2012; The amount of
inmates that are spending time related to non payment of penalty (13.98 daily)

GRTU has been however duly informed that the local prisons
are not within the remit of the Justice Ministry and accordingly these will now
be forwarded to the Prime Minister under whose portfolio this issue actually
falls.

This issue has been a bone of serious
contention between GRTU and the PN in Government since the introduction of VAT.
The two John Dalli VAT Acts have been unnecessarily cruel on entrepreneurs
given that VAT registered entrepreneurs have been forced at law to become tax
collectors and forced keepers of taxation moneys without any compensation
whatsoever and with all the extremely rigorous and time consuming and
excessively bureaucratic procedures involved. Most of the offences and
excessive penalties reflect the draconian articles in the Dalli VAT laws. These
should have been positively reformed years ago. Indeed, GRTU has been promised
this years ago.

Integrated System for Quality
Assessment and Automating Filling of Potholes with a Synthetic Substance for
Reinforcing Patching Materials – The
Commercial Need and or Opportunity – Potholes are a problem plaguing a wide
variety of countries and climates. They represent a consistent and re-occurring
problem impacting EU road networks. Current costs to governments are
excessively high. There was an estimated €550 million directly attributed to
potholes (EU 2010), which still left a significant shortfall, and a growing
backlog of unresolved cases.

Current attempts to resolve these
problems are numerous and varied. Manual labour is the most common form of
repair, involving site assessment, preparation of the hole and application of
either temporary (faster) or longer term patching materials. This is labour
intensive and slow, leading to longer disruptions, higher cost, and creating
heightened safety. Several current systems provide a more automated method,
however costs can prohibit use and there are some major restrictions – many of
them cannot operate anything but perfect weather conditions, and they still
require significant manual input, as well as sometimes producing poor results.

The Proposed
Technological Solution

The project solution is to develop an
integrated system for quality assessment and automated filling of potholes. A
new synthetic substance for reinforcing existing patching materials would also
be developed. HoleInOne follows a holistic approach to deliver a fully
automatic (a self-propelled unit assuming no repair crew and one supervisor
only) pothole patching process and machine by:

Integrating mature technologies to automate site
evaluation, pothole preparation and patch application

Implementing an end-to-end process control and in-line
quality controls with adaptive characteristics

Incorporating an expert system to facilitate the
computer-aided evaluation and decision support process

Together with the development of new,
nano-engineered, emulsified asphalt emulsion that virtually fit any application
and will lend themselves into the new (automated) process, the proposed
HoleInOne solution has the potential to achieve faster and cheaper pothole
repairs under any conditions.

Potential
Impact for the Consortium members

The companies who will decide to
participate could have long term economic benefits after the dissemination of
the idea. We believe that a realistic target is to achieve sales to value of
€10 million per annum, five years following the project's completion.

If
interested contact Abigail Mamo at GRTU.