The Malta's Union of Teachers (MUT) has raised concern over the government's decision to have workers go back to their workplace, as a number of administrative workers have reported that the Covid-19 health protocols are not being implemented at their offices.

On Thursday, the MUT issued a statement in which it expressed its disappointment towards the fact that the government never discussed any protocols with the union despite the fact that the protocols state that there needs to be a discussion with the worker's representatives.

Additionally, the union has received a number of complaints from its members that not all of the protocols are being implemented even though they were released by the government itself.

For this reason, the union is not ready to direct its members to go back to work and put them at risk as "the normality that is being continuously mentioned is not really normality at all, it is a series of restrictions that need to followed rigorously."

This statement caused some confusion as to who the MUT is referring to seeing that they represent educators but there have been no directives for teachers to get back to school after months of working from home.

Speaking to The Malta Independent MUT President Marco Bonnici, clarified that this statement does not apply for educators, as they are still working from home. It applies to a number of administrative workers whose jobs revolve mainly around office work but have been working remotely throughout the pandemic. This includes education officials, workers in student services and also some managerial personnel at MCAST who have raised concern over the lack of protocols at the workplace.

"We are in a situation where the government is not consulting us and we have been informed by our members that their offices are not equipped as there have been a number of protocols that were overlooked," Bonnici said. "How can the government ask people to go back to work without implementing their own protocols?"

Asked if they have been in contact with the government about this, Bonnici said that the union spoke with the Employment and Education Ministry immediately after word came out that people will be allowed to go back to work. However, the ministry was evasive and insisted that all protocols are being followed.

On Monday, Prime Minister Robert Abela announced the third and final relaxation of measures which saw the revocation of the remaining legal notices of preventive measures that were issued at the start of the pandemic. This caused a number of workers to head back to their workplace as per usual, under certain social distancing and hygiene conditions.

UHM statement

The UHM - Voice of the Workers, in a statement, said that it was also not consulted by the government over administrative workers at the University of Malta, MCAST, government schools and other services within the Education Ministry returning to work from tomorrow.

The union said that the workplaces are not in line with the protocols issued by the Superintendence of Public Health. The union said that it is not right for the employees to go back given this situation."It is clear that the risk assessments did not take place. The union issued directives for these institutions, for the union's members not to go back to work and continue working according to the arrangements they had over the past weeks.