“After five years in operation its time there was an audit of the organisation’s operative structure which would lead to a restructuring of the same authority,” the minister said.
Asked whether the restructuring process was linked to further budget cuts following the half million cut announced earlier this year, Dr Zammit Dimech said the exercise was not really linked to budget revision but more to the efficiency and effectiveness of the authority’s operations.
Among the measures taken this year in terms of cost cutting, was the dropping of all the authority’s consultancies, which amounted to some Lm70,000, confirmed the minister.
A report published by the World Travel and Tourism Council, Dr Zammit Dimech said, shows that percentage-wise, Malta is the biggest
spending country among the newly acceded EU countries, adding that Malta’s budget was almost double that of average in the EU.
The expenditure is justified by the fact that tourism is Malta’s economic driving force, he said, however we have to ensure that the money is being used
effectively.
This exercise has just that aim, he added, to make sure the funds injected are used efficiently and effectively.
Deloitte and Touche will be carrying out the audit – which has been split into three phases – an analysis of the present scenario at MTA, recommendations and implementation.
Reports for the first two phases are to be handed to the authority by the end of September, while the deadline for the implementation will depend on the recommendations themselves.
The Authority itself has set up a strategy group that will monitor the progress of the audit.
The group is lead by MTA chairman Chris Grech and includes MHRA president Winston Zahra, George Micallef and Sam Mifsud.
Later in the afternoon the Malta Hotels & Restaurants Association (MHRA) issued a statement welcoming the announcement of the restructuring.
The association has been calling for this decision for months, the statement said. “The tourism industry has changed radically in the past few years and the MHRA felt it was necessary for such a restructuring exercise to take place so as to ensure that the authority is geared up to meet the current and future challenges that the industry is facing.”
In this connection the association said that it was very pleased the Minister for Tourism gave the go-ahead for a strategic team to be set up a few weeks ago with the aim of spearheading this restructuring exercise and that it was given representation in the team.
MHRA president Winston Zahra said that this is a very positive step for the MTA. “We are confident that with the strategic team in place and with the help of the experts appointed to draw up the necessary audit on human resources, procedures and systems we will be able to come up with a fresh dynamic structure for the authority to be able to move forward more efficiently and productively in future.”