Over 450 people are employed in positions of trust with government ministries, parliamentary secretariats and government entities, according to a series of Freedom of Information (FoI) requests sent by this newspaper to each government ministry.
The exercise encompasses 13 of the government’s 15 ministries, with details from the Tourism Ministry and European Affairs Ministry still pending yesterday.
Across the board, positions of trust listed by ministries ran the full gamut – from cleaners, estate keepers, a crate washing service coordinator, the ever-famous dog handler, a maintenance/crane and forklift operator, and a day care centre cleaner, to the commandant of the police academy, top brass at government authorities and chiefs of staff.
At 112, the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM) is, by far, the ministry with the largest complement of people in positions of trust. A total of 50 people in positions of trust were hired without a call for applications under the OPM’s International Conferences 2015 Unit, tasked with organising last month’s Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting and the Valletta Summit on Migration.
Interestingly, Phyllis Muscat, Head of the CHOGM Taskforce, is the only OPM position of trust employee on the highest government salary, Scale 1. The Unit’s staff complement will be kept on the government payroll until the year’s end.
According to data provided by the OPM through the FoI request, the often controversial political appointee Glenn Bedingfield handles the co-ordination of Parliamentary Questions in the OPM’s PQ Unit.
Two estate keepers at Girgenti Palace and Villa Francia have also been given positions of trust and are tasked with “House-keeping duties at Girgenti/Villa Francia”. Eleven positions in the OPM’s Government Customer Care Unit are also listed.
As for the Parliamentary Secretary for Planning and Simplification of Administrative Processes Michael Falzon, his secretariat employs the maximum number of 11 people on positions of trust – all within the secretariat.
Drivers for former ministers Carmelo Mifsud Bonnici and former Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi are also listed in the overall list, and so is the ‘Personal Assistant to former Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi’, whose job description now reads ‘Coordinating Administrative functions in the office of former Prime Minister’.
While the OPM provided the most organised and comprehensive data under the FoI requests, the same cannot be said for others, such as the Energy Ministry, which provided neither names of people below Scale 6 nor the full list of salary scales for positions.
Ministries do not provide all details requested
Not a single ministry, meanwhile, provided the full details of all positions of trust as asked for under the FoI requests. In fact, all government ministries insisted on listing only current positions of trust and refused to include past positions of trust. The names of people in positions of trust on Scale 6 salaries and under were not provided.
In all cases, only basic salaries were provided and full financial packages were not divulged,
This newspaper sent FOI requests to all ministries asking for the names, financial packages and duties of all people employed, since March 2013, in positions of trust within their ministries and all departments and entities falling under their remit. For those no longer in such positions, ministries were asked to provide the same details and also their date of termination.
None of the ministries included those who no longer hold positions of trust, with the reason provided being: “…the contracts and conditions of persons who are no longer in positions of trust are not being disclosed, as they no longer hold public office”. In the vast majority of cases, full financial packages were not given and only a basic salary was provided, despite our specific request.
As for the non-provision of names of those holding positions of trust on salaries lower than Scale 5, most ministries explained: “Only names and surnames of employees in Salary Scale 5 or higher will be provided since these occupy a position analogous to Category A within the Public Service.”
None of the ministries provided a full list of names of those employed in positions of trust, but rather only of those employed with salary scales of 1-5, with one or two ministries including some people employed in positions of trust in salary Scale 6.
None of the ministries disclosed the contracts of the employees, however a number of them, including the Office of the Prime Minister, did include sample contracts for those engaged “on a person of trust basis” for both full-timers and part-timers.
The Ministry for European Affairs is still to send the information, while the Ministry for Tourism was the only ministry to charge for the FoI request, and withheld the information until payment for processing fees are received.
Employment demarcation line becoming more blurred
Government recruitment, excluding staff within ministerial secretariats, which are normally staffed by political appointees, is normally carried out through a competitive exercise under the guidance of the Public Service Commission.
Ministries, according to the Engagement of Staff for Minister’s Secretariat guidelines of March 2013, are allowed a total of 19 such secretariat staff, parliamentary secretaries are allowed 11 and the Office of the Prime Minister is afforded 37 secretariat staff.
Ombudsman Judge Joseph Said Pullicino referred to the issue of positions of trust a year ago, remarking that members of the public service should be apolitical and be loyal to all administrations, but this does not mean that government ministers do not have the right to appoint persons of trust to draft and implement its policies.
He wrote in the ‘Ombudsplan 2015’ document that: “It was long thought that these appointments should be restricted in number and limited to the ministers’ private secretariats. During the past few years, however, the demarcation line between recruitment in the civil service and ministries is becoming more blurred. Successive governments are adopting a policy of directly engaging people in departments and authorities. These appointments are not limited to the highest levels of public administration.”
The Ombudsman's opinion was that, when these cases become a part of the executive’s style, rather than being isolated and exceptional cases, they give rise to situations of lack of transparency and accountability. This might be the case for a number of reasons, including the lack of appointments through calls for applications and respect for established procedures for the employment of people in the public service.
He wrote at the time, “In some aspects, we are moving towards the American mentality where public service employees are considered to be no longer valid when there is a change in government and the new administration thinks it has a right to replace them with people loyal to it.”
While not expressing his opinion on which system might be the best, the Judge Said Pullicino asked whether the time has come for a debate on the controversial subject. “Whatever the choice, any system of engagement with the public service should be completely transparent, subject to clear and unambiguous laws that ensure accountability.”
The former Chief Justice also noted that the vague definition of a “position of trust” might be being used as an excuse by governments to make appointments that might not be completely in line with the law. “The widening of the definition of persons of trust might lead to allegations of abuse and discrimination. The government might be seen as trying to avoid established procedures that regulate employment in the civil service and the public sector.”
No validity in not providing data on past positions of trust
Dr Antonio Ghio, a data law specialist, when contacted for an opinion on ministries’ failure to provide all the data requested, commented that the fact they have not specified an exact reason as to why certain information has been withheld is disputable as, according to Dr Ghio, “They are obliged, by law, to provide a specific reason and that goes beyond whether the reason is right or wrong.”
Asked specifically about the refusal to give information on people who are no longer in a position of trust, just because they no longer hold public office, Dr Ghio said that this explanation “is as valid as a government who had a contractual relationship with a company, now expired, saying that this contract never existed. The fact that this person is no longer employed in this position doesn’t mean that historically, at a point in time they didn’t”.
As for only the salary scale being given when asked for complete financial packages, Dr Ghio said that the term financial package should entail things beyond a salary: “If they just provide a salary, one would assume, if all the information has been provided, that their financial package would be solely their salary. Now if there is some perk or allowance, mobile phone etc, which should be included in the definition of the financial package, then they did not provide all the information.”
As for the Freedom of Information Act, he believes that the current version of the legislation is more an exercise in assisting the government to withhold information, as opposed to being a real enabling tool with which interested parties have a right to obtain information that should be available to the public.
“A reconsideration of the whole act should be discussed,” he urged.