The European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) had mixed words of praise and criticism for Malta in terms of the ways in which it deals with and prevents ethnic discrimination.

The FRA’s study, entitled Report on Racism and Xenophobia in the Member States of the EU, was presented at the European Parliament on Monday.

The agency’s report frowned upon the fact that there is no Maltese case law on ethnic discrimination – meaning the key concepts of anti-discrimination legislation on ethnic or racial discrimination have not been applied, tested or interpreted by the courts – as well as on the fact that unemployment figures for immigrants from outside the EU do not exist.

The FRA also criticised the fact that not a single sanction had been applied or compensation awarded in cases of ethnic discrimination during 2006, even though the laws and procedures to do so were in place.

On the other hand, the FRA commended two programmes underway in 2006 – one dealing with cultural awareness and anti-racism training of the Malta Police Force, and the other the in-service courses with a specific emphasis on human rights for social studies teachers.

The report, which covers data and the state of affairs in 2006, also observed how Malta had been slow to adopt the legislation transposing the European Union’s Racial Equality Directive which, by the end of 2006, had not yet been seen through and that, last year, there had been no specialised body for the promotion of equal treatment on the grounds of race or ethnic origin.

In April, however, the government published Legal Notice 85 – the Equal Treatment of Persons Order, 2007 – which transposes the EU directive. The Legal Notice, under the European Union Act, also extends the remit of the National Commission for the Promotion of Equality (NCPE) from matters limited to gender equality to also enable it to investigate complaints on the grounds of racial or ethnic origin. The legal notice empowers the NCPE to look into complaints over social protection, social advantages, education, housing and other goods and services available to the public.

The agency called for statistics on unemployment of non-EU immigrants – lacking in Malta, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Hungary, Poland, Slovenia and Slovakia – in order to better gauge discrimination of ethnic minorities, such as migrants who have received refugee or subsidiary protection status in Malta.

“This imperfect comparison of unemployment rates illustrates the need for improved data in this area. Statistics on citizenship alone are of limited value for examining issues of discrimination, whereas data which identify ethnic and national origin would produce a much clearer picture,” the report recommended.

Malta was also one of the countries that provided no indication that any sanctions had been applied or compensation awarded in cases of ethnic discrimination during 2006, although laws and procedures were in place.

Another issue was that of existing case law on ethnic or racial discrimination in the courts of Malta which, the Agency said, did not exist in Malta as at the end of 2006. Other countries with an absence of such case law included Cyprus, Estonia, Greece, Lithuania, Poland and Spain.

“This means that in these countries the key concepts of anti-discrimination legislation concerning ethnic/racial discrimination have not been applied, tested or interpreted by courts,” the report noted.

“Other Member States (including Malta) are also categorised as having limited data collection because they only report on a handful of court cases related to specific offence categories.”

Malta’s police force was meanwhile applauded for having continued to give its staff training on racism and xenophobia and the relevant Maltese legislation, and on how trainees, as part of the police force, should deal with incidents of racism.

The report observed how the course had been repeated seven times in 2006 as part of police in-service training.

Similarly, the FRA also commended Malta’s training of social studies teachers with a specific emphasis on human rights.

The report also noted that Malta and eight other EU

member states had not yet joined the Task Force for International Cooperation on Holocaust Education.