New Ryanair maintenance facility to open in Malta

Jun 21 2022

Ryanair will start servicing some of its aircraft in Malta at a newly inaugurated €20 million maintenance and overhaul facility close to the Malta airport.

With the announcement made during a press conference at Castille, Ryanair’s CEO Eddie Wilson said that operations will start in October. It will operate with one maintenance bay employing 20 people, but will eventually grow to around 250 employees.

Phase 1 will see the airline operating from an existing hangar before growing into a new three-bay hangar. Ryanair has a subsidiary airline in Malta and operates to 62 destinations from the island.

With over 500 aircraft under Ryanair, the CEO thanked Malta Enterprise for facilitating the investment. He said working in Malta was as easy as working in Ireland, where the airline is based.

Prime Minister Robert Abela, Economy Minister Silvio Schembri and Industry Minister Miriam Dalli all welcomed the investment.

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Man arrested for stealing from religious sites in Siggiewi and Zebbug

Jun 21 2022

Police from the Major Crimes Unit, accompanied by Hal Qormi district police, arrested a 38-year-old man resident of Haz-Zebbug for three thefts from religious sites in Siggiewi and Haz-Zebbug.

Investigations revealed that the man broke into sanctuaries and chapels to steal various items and cash as well as a donation box from beneath a statue.

Investigations led the police to identify the man and arrest him yesterday morning in Haz-Zebbug. The man was arraigned in court today at around 1100hrs.

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Wardens not issuing traffic fines or towing cars to protest work conditions

Jun 21 2022

Wardens are protesting their working conditions and demanding better salaries by not issuing traffic fines or towing away illegally parked cars. Some are also not showing up to reported road accidents.

Following the General Workers’ Union issuing a directive over the weekend, LESA officials also started to show up to work without a uniform. Times of Malta was informed by a warden that wardens are still pulling people over to explain to them that they are breaking the law.

However, they are not fining people doing so, including people using their phone or parking on double yellow lines. Since the GWU said talks with he agency over a new agreement failed, all LESA wardens, who are members of the GWU, have been given these new directives.

The agency said that it is still important to continue honouring policing duties by drawing attention to those caught breaking the law. With around 60 collisions reported to LESA daily, officers are also taking longer to attend to accident sites, and that only one out of six are attending to them.

The union is insisting that the wardens’ salaries should match prison and detention centre wardens’ salaries. It is also asking for more robust measures to protect warden safety.

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Local nurses wear black as union taken to court over lack of staff directives

Jun 21 2022

Some 4,000 nurses from several Maltese health services and homes for the elderly have started wearing black T-shirts to mourn their union being taken to court over directives to address shortage of staff.

According to the Malta Union of Midwives and Nurses’ president Paul Pace, the nurses are wearing black because Malta is ‘the only European country where a union is taken to court for protesting over staff shortages.’

Speaking with Times of Malta, Pace said that instead of finding help from the Health Ministry, the union was given a lawsuit for speaking out in favour of the rights of nurses.

The nurses’ union was provisionally blocked by a judge last week from continuing industrial action across the entire health service after upholding an application for an injunction filed by health authorities.

A request for a prohibitory injunction filed by the health ministry was upheld by Mr Justice Ian Spiteri Bailey, ordering the union to stop its action until the case is heard on June 27th. Suspending the action, the union told the nurses to wear black instead of the usual uniform to mourn their profession and to protest at the inaction by authorities.

The directives issued by the union included not admitting patients to particular wards and a home for the elderly, taking a two-hour break each day at operating theatres and limiting the hours in which nurses could dress wounds. Health authorities refused the pension call and refused the request for nurses’ and midwives’ overtime to be taxed at 10%.

Pace revealed that 500 nurses left the profession last year. Many were foreign health workers leaving Malta after being offered much better conditions in other countries. Pace said that the directives were not aimed at impacting patients but to highlight the struggles nurses are facing.

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Photo Source: Paul Pace FB