New agreement signed towards a more modern working environment within Heritage Malta

Heritage Malta, within the Ministry for Justice, Culture and Local Government, has embarked on a project to improve the agency and its work environment by taking necessary actions towards the modernisation of the agency’s structure, systems and processes.

During a visit at the Archaeology Museum, Minister for Justice, Culture and Local Government Owen Bonnici reiterated the importance of such projects: “In this way, we are enhancing professionalisation within the culture sector which is further developing into a social and economic generator. This investment in our cultural workforce will bring an even greater benefit to our society, as we keep on striving to ensure that this is an inclusive and accessible sector. Through its strategy, the agency is cultivating the culture sector, and this can already be seen especially through its hugely successful schemes such as the Heritage Malta Passports and open days”.

The first step that is being taken in order to work towards this aim is by improving employee salaries given that these have been agreed and set in 2010. Since then, many factors have changed, including the market forces, the internal and external environments, the competition and the supply/demand of the workforce itself.

In this respect, Heritage Malta and its employees signed a new salary structure agreement with the General Workers Union. The agency and the union recognise that the best interests of employees are covered by this agreement, and shall be served by ensuring that the best of relations is enjoyed between them.

The new salary structure agreement was signed by Noel Zammit, Acting Chief Executive Officer on behalf of Heritage Malta, and Kendrick Bondin, Secretary of the Government and Public Entities Section on behalf of the General Workers Union.

This agreement was developed based on discussions held between the two parties, endorsing a new salary structure reflecting changes within the organisational structure.

Noel Zammit stressed the importance of aligning work practices to more current practices. “It is imperative to start such restructuring by addressing the employee work conditions and wages. We cannot embark on this initiative on the wrong footing. We had to react to changes in the work environment by first adjusting salaries and so putting the agency at par with the market. This increase was also made possible through the past two years’ positive performance of the agency.”