The majority of people have expressed their concerns with salaries, the cost of living, traffic, electricity provision and the country's current population size, but are happy with the health services, data obtained via MaltaSurvey shows.

The survey is the first to be carried out following an agreement signed by Standard Publications Limited and IDEA Intelligence, which administers maltasurvey.com, to develop periodic national surveys on politics, current affairs and other subjects of public interest.

Standard Publications is the publisher of The Malta Independent on Sunday, The Malta Independent (daily), The Malta Business Weekly and www.independent.com.mt.

IDEA Intelligence is a data-driven business intelligence wing of the IDEA Group that aims to deliver thorough quantitative insights and information through sophisticated data.

 

The survey, titled Malta Summer Sentiment 2023, was carried out between 1 and 5 August, and partly focused on some of the major issues that are affecting people in their day-to-day lives. The responses show just how poorly people view the current situation with regard to these topics, with the healthcare system being an exception and showing a more positive public sentiment.

 

Methodology

The online survey targeted those between 16-70 years of age. An online invitation was sent on social media platforms and all participants opted to voice their opinion voluntarily. Data gathering was administered solely by MaltaSurvey.com without input from The Malta Independent. While the sample is fully anonymous, demographic variables were utilised in the first section to keep control of the representativeness of the sample. The National Statistics Office's census was used to establish the required proportions of the sample by gender, age and region. After collecting the sample, the cases were weighted by the same three variables (gender, age and region) to ensure a close representation of the sample.

With a sample size of 950 participants, the findings have a margin of error of 3% at a 95% confidence level.

This survey was intentionally based on a four-point scale, thus leading respondents to make a clear choice rather than opting for a non-conclusive answer.

 

The results in a nutshell

As expected, traffic and overpopulation are major concerns among people living in Malta - 86% of survey respondents gave a poor rating to the traffic situation while, closely behind, 83%, are not satisfied with overpopulation issues.

 

 

Salaries and the cost of living are also two points of concern for the majority, but with a lower percentage when compared to traffic and overpopulation.

Inflation has been taking its toll, as is evident by the high Cost of Living Adjustment that was announced in last year's budget and the rise in prices of goods.

Both salaries and Malta's cost of living are given a "poor" rating by the majority in this sample.

When it comes to salaries and salary structures, 59.7% of respondents rated it as "poor", 29.8% rated it as "fair", 10.1% said they're "good" and less than 1% gave an "excellent" rating.

The majority sentiment across all ages is that of poor salary structures. The cohort between the ages of 16 and 17 shows the flattest distribution of opinions with 30% citing having "good" salary structures, 30% rating them as "fair" and 40% as "poor". All regions in the country show a majority of respondents saying "poor" salary structures are "poor" and all education levels echo this sentiment.

In terms of the cost of living, 73% of respondents rated it as "poor" (meaning that they are finding it hard to make ends meet), with less than 1% rating it as excellent and 4.7% rating it as "good"; 21.9% rated it as "fair".

The majority "poor" rating for the cost of living is shared across all age groups, education levels and regions.

The age group with the lowest percentage of responses rating it as "poor" were those aged 16-17, with 60% giving such an answer.

When it comes to employment conditions, things are slightly better, with the majority sentiment being between a "fair" and "poor" - 38.9% of respondents rated employment conditions as "fair" while 38.4% rated them as "poor", 20.9% said they are "good" and 1.8% said they are "excellent".

The majority sentiments by age group, region and education level fluctuate between a "fair" rating and a "poor" rating. The aged group with the highest percentage of "fair" ratings (68.4%) was the 16-17 cohort.

 

A total of 83% of the sample, with their "poor" rating, expressed great concern about overpopulation issues, followed by 12.7% rating it as "fair" and 4.3% rating it as "good". Just 0.1% gave it an "excellent" rating, meaning they are not concerned with the rising population in Malta. Over the last decade, Malta's population has risen from 425,384 in 2013 to 542,051 at the end of 2022, according to the NSO.

The majority poor rating sentiment is seen across all age groups, regions and education levels. In fact, every single respondent from the 16-17 age group rated it as "poor".

The country's population issue has been making headlines for a while. Finance Minister Clyde Caruana was reported as telling the Malta Institute of Accountants conference that the country needs to overhaul its economic model. He had said that Malta's population will have to grow to 800,000 over the next 17 years if the country is to keep its economy growing at the current rate. He said that a new economic model would need to produce more value with less input and fewer pressures on the country's infrastructure.

 

With a rising population comes the inevitable need for more people to get around the country and transport problems are high on the list of concerns for people residing in Malta.

Traffic in Malta is a topic often spoken about and it is an issue most people deem to be problematic.

In fact, 86% of survey respondents gave traffic levels and traffic flow a poor rating, while only 11.6% rated it as fair and 2.4% gave it a good rating. Not one of the respondents said traffic was "excellent". The negative sentiment of respondents towards the traffic levels and traffic flow is shared across all age groups and all regions in this survey sample.

The government has been under pressure to sort out Malta's traffic problem. Notwithstanding that a number of measures were introduced, such as the introduction of free public transport for all last year, recent NSO figures show that the number of cars on the road is still rising each day. During the second quarter of this year, according to NSO figures, the stock of licensed motor vehicles increased at a net average rate of 58 motor vehicles per day.

Another issue of concern is related to road works carried out across the island, which is probably also leading to excessive traffic. The majority of respondents also rated road works as "poor", which may imply that these are seen as inconvenience and/or not planned well. However, the magnitude of this concern was substantially lower than that of the traffic levels and flow in Malta. A total of 64.8% gave a "poor" rating of their perspective of the road works process in Malta, with 22.7% giving a "fair" rating, while a further 11.1% gave it a "good" rating . Only 1.4% rated the road works process as "excellent".

Ratings of the road works process were "poor" for over 50% across each age group and every region, except for the Southern Harbour region. Here, while the "poor" rating was still chosen by the majority of respondents from this region (48.3%), it was the only region where such an answer was selected by fewer than 50% of the respondents.

The air quality in Malta also received a failing grade. There are many factors that affect air quality, including but not limited to the amount of traffic and vehicles on the road being one of them.

A total of 69% of the sample gave the air quality in Malta a "poor" rating, followed by 22.7% giving it a "fair" rating; 8.1% of our participants rated our air quality as "good" and less than 1% rated it as "excellent".

This majority sentiment is shared across all age demographics barring the 16/17-year-old cohort where the majority was that of a "fair" rating rather than a "poor" one. Every region and education level has expressed a majority of "poor" sentiments towards air quality.

A positive element in the survey was Malta's healthcare system. A total of 41.3% rate the system as "good" while 14.5% rate it as "excellent". A further 28.4% of respondents rate the quality of healthcare as fair, while 15.9% gave it a poor rating. This means that a combined total of 55.8% are satisfied with the quality of the country's healthcare.

The majority sentiment for all regions shows a "good" outlook of Malta's healthcare system in terms of quality, except for the Gozo region where the highest percentage opted to reply "fair".

As for the answers given by age groups across all regions, the answer given by most was "good".

The age group with the highest percentage of "poor" ratings were those aged 16-17 (26.3% of respondents from this age group), which is identical to the percentage from this group who gave it an "excellent" rating.

The 61-70 age group saw the most positive ratings (either excellent or good) when compared to other age groups.

 

This survey was carried between 1 and 5 August, following 10 days of substantial power cuts across the country during the heatwave. The power cuts had seen localities frequently losing power for many hours, at times more than a whole day, when the country was facing temperatures of over 40 degrees Celsius. This, no doubt, had an impact on the outcome of the survey, as such a protracted situation has a high chance of swaying social sentiments.

This sentiment was reflected in the survey result with the majority of respondents, amounting to a high 66.9%, giving a "poor" rating to the country's electricity provision. Nevertheless, a total 20.8% of all respondents rated it as "fair", 10.6% as "good" and 1.7% as "excellent". A further 60% of respondents or more in every age group rated electricity provision as "poor". When looking at responses by region, all regions saw over 50% of respondents give the "poor" rating.

 

Respondents were also asked for their sentiments towards Malta's current state of political climate and debate across all parties.

The majority (74.1%) rated this as "poor". This is followed by 18.9% giving it a "fair" rating. Less than a combined 8% have a positive sentiment towards the state of the country's political climate and quality of debate.

This majority "poor" sentiment is replicated across all regions, education levels and age groups excluding the cohort aged between 16-17 years. In this age group, 47.4% of respondents rated it as "fair", which was still the highest percentage response in this age group.

The final question saw participants asked whether this summer is better, worse or the same quality as the previous summers considering all the factors mentioned.

This sample shows 72.1% classifying this summer as worse than previous ones, 24.4% classifying it as the same quality as previous ones and 3.5% stating it is better than previous ones, which is of no surprise given the answers in the other categories.

 

More survey results will be published tomorrow