In the 10 years since 2002, Malta has had to cope with the arrival of over 14,000 irregular, often illegal, immigrants to its shores. How well has Malta coped?

The short answer is that Malta has coped adequately. The initial influx through the central Mediterranean caught Malta flat-footed. There was a broadly similar reaction throughout Europe, the key difference being that most major European countries had already had decades-long experience of dealing with (black) immigrants and the manpower and financial resources to respond.

In Malta’s case, there was no such infrastructure in place and the human and financial capacity to cope was inevitably limited. Nor were there the policy and institutional tools available. The government had to create all these from scratch, while simultaneously trying to deal with the influx of hundreds of dispossessed Africans fleeing their country for a better life in Europe.

Slowly, the organisational, legal and resource structures were put in place. The Office of the Commissioner for Refugees, including the Appeals Board, has made huge strides in its ability to handle all the applications for asylum that it receives expeditiously, fairly and in a humane manner. Almost 300 have been given refugee status, 6,000 have been given some form of ‘subsidiary protection’ and about 4,600 have had their cases rejected. Other cases are still pending.

In the infrastructure field, the challenges have been even greater. Police and military barracks had to be pressed into service as Closed and Open Accommodation Centres were constructed. The conditions under which asylum-seekers are held have gradually improved over the years with the use of mobile homes and purpose-built accommodation. Despite efforts to raise standards, however, conditions have been no more than adequate. At peak times, conditions have left much to be desired.

The policy of detention is, on balance, the only sensible way for the government to control the heavy influx into this small, extremely densely populated country. The weight of argument in favour of retaining it is unanswerable. It would be both impolitic and impractical to alter the current arrangements. The key lies in ensuring that the period spent in detention is as brief as possible, that applications for asylum are handled expeditiously and that conditions in the Closed Accommodation Centres are more than, as now, just adequate. The upper limit of 18 months’ detention for those whose applications have been rejected should however be reviewed.

The human resources to police the immigrants placed in the Closed and Open Accommodation Centres has proved perhaps Malta’s greatest challenge. Initially, the weight of responsibility to provide the manpower fell on the shoulders of the Armed Forces of Malta and the Malta Police Force. It was recognised, however, that soldiers and policemen were not the right people for this task. A new force was therefore created. The Detention Service, made up of civilians, was formed. Although the force is still under command of mainly military and police officers, and the quality of some of the staff and their training could undoubtedly be improved, it does an adequate job in relieving the AFM and Police manpower of this guarding task.

As to the organisation to provide for the welfare of immigrants in the Closed and Open Accommodation Centres, this responsibility falls on the small but extremely hard-working Agency for the Welfare of Asylum-Seekers (AWAS). This organisation was developed as a result of the need for the welfare support of refugees to be continued once their cases had been decided and while they settled into the community.

These are the structures now in place. They have evolved in response to developing pressures as each year saw a fresh influx of irregular immigrants arriving in Malta and as the enormity of the challenge dawned on politicians and population alike.

The problem of irregular immigration to Malta is a long-term one. There is a need for politicians on both sides of the political divide to acknowledge that the influx is unlikely to abate. It will wax and wane, as it has done over the last 10 years.

What happens next? At any one time about 2,000 immigrants are housed in Open Accommodation Centres in Marsa and Ħal Far, about 1,000 or more in Closed Accommodation Centres, and about 1,500 (the Police do not have reliable figures) living in the community – mostly in areas where accommodation is cheap. For planning purposes it would be wise to assume that, despite continuing efforts at resettlement in EU countries or the United States, there will probably be a core of about 4,000 refugees living in Malta at any one time. How should Malta organise itself to cope with the relatively new phenomenon of Africans living and working among us?

Regrettably, ‘integration’ has become a dirty word politically as both government and Opposition pander to the concerns – invariably ill-informed and racially prejudiced – of some sections of the electorate. This reluctance to face the issue should be seen not as political prudence as the two political parties jockey for votes, but as moral cowardice.

On a matter of such social importance, it is invidious of the parties to play political games. The political consensus and bi-partisan approach that existed when the crisis first broke need to be restored. Politicians, and the Church, have a duty to give a lead. The longer proactive steps to develop policies in the fields of employment, education, housing and social security are postponed, the more difficult the consequences will be.

It is in Malta’s long-term interests, socially as well as economically, to adopt a firm, well-ordered and structured policy of inclusion, not exclusion, of those who are already living among us. At its most basic, a policy of inclusion means that all those who have been granted asylum or some form of protected status should receive equal treatment under our laws and benefit socially equally for employment, housing, education, health and social security purposes. They should enter the ‘main-stream’ of government administration. This makes sense not only administratively, but also socially and economically. In an ageing population, the sooner we mobilise this largely untapped source of (young) legitimate labour, the better.

Politically also, the benefits will be significant. As a civilised, democratic country with a long tradition of absorbing different nationalities, we should not tolerate the treatment of anybody – of whatever race, colour or creed – any differently from the way we treat our own countrymen. More importantly, however, there is already a risk of a ghetto-isation occurring in our community, with particular parts of the country becoming the homes of immigrants and placing more pressures on housing, educational, health and other amenities. This development cannot bode well for future social harmony.

It is vital that a policy of inclusion for those who will inevitably settle here in the long term is developed, funded and instituted. To succeed, there must be a bi-partisan political approach adopted and the political will and leadership to take the necessary steps to implement it.

This article is an abridged version of an essay in a compendium published by The Today Public Policy and can be found on www.tppi.org.mt Institute, ‘Into the Future: Socio-economic or Security Challenges for Malta’ (www.tppi.org.mt)

Martin Scicluna is the

Director General of Malta’s only independent think-tank, the

Today Public Policy Institute.

He writes here in his personal capacity