The Public Administration Human Resources Office (PAHRO) and the Finance Ministry have given the green light for 150 reserve police constables to join the force.
This emerged in parliament earlier this week after shadow home affairs minister Jason Azzopardi posed a number of questions to Home Affairs Minister Manuel Mallia.
The total number of reserve constables the force is to have by the end of this year is quite significant when compared to previous years, especially when one takes into consideration the fact that only nine reserve police constables had been engaged specifically for the CHOGM summit (the heads of government meeting) held 10 years ago, and over the fact that 112 reserve constables were engaged from 2002 onwards, including one in 2011 and another in 2013. In 2012 no reserve constables were engaged. From the start of this year, 101 reserve constables have joined the force and more are to follow.
When contacted and asked why the number of reserve constables was much higher than previous years, Ramona Attard, the ministry of home affairs’ spokesperson, explained that the force is being beefed up in preparation for next year’s CHOGM summit, the EU presidency in 2017, and Valletta 2018.
Besides, Ms Attard highlighted that the Police Corp was found to be in a demoralised state and in a bid to boost the morale of police officers, most of whom were looking forward to their retirement due to a low morale which engulfed the force, the government was looking to reinstate a number of officers, be it reserve constables or full time police officers.
“This government,” she said, “values the experience of police officers who abandoned the force for various reasons and those who retired but were willing to be reinstated”.
It has not been ruled out that some of the reserve constables joining the force may be 65 and over.
Malta will be hosting its second CHOGM meeting within the space of a decade. The news was first broken in the New Zealand media, with reports saying that even that country’s government had offered to host CHOGM 2015. The New Zealand Herald quoted Prime Minister John Key saying that “he would be happy to host the meeting, although it was possible Malta would take over instead”. He said Malta was keen to act as host, but New Zealand would be happy to if Malta could not. The only problem is that Vanuatu will host the 2019 meeting and that would mean two meetings in the same region in a row.
Prime Minister Joseph Muscat had been quoted saying that the Maltese government was happy take up the offer and host the CGOGM meeting if no other country offered.