“I was shocked when I saw Malta’s ranking in the Ease of Doing Business Index and knew that I had to address the issue immediately,” Prime Minister Joseph Muscat said today after presiding over the signing of an agreement to reduce bureaucratic processes in the public sector.
After Malta ranked 80th in the index, out of a total of 189 countries, Dr Muscat said that he could no longer accept contradictory results for Malta where we are being praised for our impressive economic growth, but then still end up this low in other statistics.
The commitment which was signed by representatives of government departments and entities is a collection of deadlines and methods with the final aim to reduce bureaucracy and increase accountability.
In his address, Dr Muscat explained that economic competitivity depends on a large number of factors, not only how much workers are paid. Everything from energy costs to the state of infrastructure can affect the national economy; however one crucial aspect is the efficiency of the public sector.
Dr Muscat said the agreement is not simply a list of intentions, but concrete commitments to reduce the time taken to do business and hold negotiations. Malta Enterprise, along with the Principal Permanent Secretary, Mr Mario Cutajar, were tasked with undergoing an urgent study on the “paradoxical” result and find ways to tackle any problems.
The Prime Minister said that there were some doubts as to whether the methodology used to compile the data for the index was appropriate for the small size of Malta, but the issues still needed to be tackled regardless.
“We now have clear and concrete targets and deadlines for these processes to be reduced and every institution that signed will be held accountable,” Dr Muscat said. He added that the team which worked on formulating the agreement will keep functioning and making sure that all commitments are met.
The Prime Minister said there are currently a number of exciting changes in terms of public services and how to reach more clients. Dr Muscat then announced that, by next year, there will be a number of mobile apps to replace out current online services as they are now outdated.
Mr Cutajar said that one of the largest problems in the Public Sector as a whole is a lack of communication both internally between departments and externally with clients. When the public sector took a snapshot of the last three years, Mr Cutajar said that they realized that the reforms which came into place in the 90s lost their stride.
The commitments signed today are in a bid for progress to stop dragging along slowly and take off once again at a faster pace. “We embarked on an exercise to address a serious leadership crisis,” Mr Cutajar said, detailing that it was done so with a series of deadlines and plans to reduce procedures in terms of time and bureaucracy by up to 80% in some instances.