Workers on the state payroll, except for those who have been politically appointed, will have to adhere to a soon-to-be-launched new set of guidelines when using social media and making public comments, The Malta Independent can reveal.

The new guidelines, in the form of a Social Media Policy for government employees, will be launched next week by the head of the Civil Service Mario Cutajar.

Speaking with this newspaper yesterday, Mr Cutajar said that a new policy to be launched aims to tackle better the issue of social media use.  

“The new guidelines will apply for all those workers who are on the state payroll,” he highlighted.

There have been many instances in which people appointed by government have been criticised for having gone a step too far when posting their personal views on social media. The criticism gets harsher when a person goes off on a rant, as often happens. But, to date, nothing much has been done to contain such situations.

Since it is nearly impossible, on an individual basis, to control each and every person from airing their views, the government will be attempting to address the issue by publishing this new set of guidelines.

“One cannot forget that we have a Code of Ethics in place to adhere to as well,” Mr Cutajar pointed out.

While stating that the guidelines will seek to ensure that workers on the state payroll will use social media more scrupulously, Mr Cutajar stressed that the policy is also aimed at encouraging the civil service to reach out to the people it serves – in other words, to the community.

“Digital and social media can help the civil service reach out to the people it serves by promoting government’s services and to help them engage with the public,” he said.

Asked whether politically-appointed state employees would be subject to the same rules, Mr Cutajar said that they would not be bound to them in the same as regular employees.  In cases of politically-appointed people, whose contracts are renewed on an annual basis, Mr Cutajar said he could only encourage the guidelines to be followed since they do not, strictly-speaking, fall under his remit.

Nor will the rules be applicable to chairmen of state entities, for the same reason.

In reaction, the Nationalist Party said that four days after the PN had proposed stricter standards for use of social media by people employed in public administration, the Labour government is saying it will be doing the same thing.

However, the argument brought by Mr Cutajar in The Malta Independent - that such guideliness are not applicable to politically-appointed people - does not make sense. It is these people who are politically appointed who should be more careful on the use of social media, the PN said.