The CEO of the Occupational Health and Safety Authority on Thursday told the public inquiry board looking into the death of Jean Paul Sofia that workplace accidents have decreased in the past years, despite the perception being otherwise.
OHSA CEO Mark Gauci - who has served in this role ever since the OHSA was set up in 2001 - was one of five witnesses to testify before the public inquiry on Thursday.
Public inquiry board chair Joseph Zammit McKeon's first tranche of questions focused on the authority's enforcement capabilities.
He asked how many enforcement officers the OHSA has had over the past five years, and whether they were limited to the construction sector only or to all workplaces.
Gauci said that it is important to point out that the OHSA does not only work on the construction industry, but with every other sector. He continued by saying that OHSA has 13 inspectors - one less than what the OHSA's chairman David Xuereb had said earlier in the morning.
Xuereb had said that the authority had asked for the budget to increase the enforcement team up to 45, but the money never came, particularly amidst concerns that there wasn't competent people to employ in the first place.
Gauci however said that there are plenty of competent people out there, but how many of those want to act as inspectors is another matter.
"They do not have..." Gauci cautiously began in order to describe the problem; "I'll say it for you... they do not want to get into other people's business [jilhaq salib haddiehor]," Zammit McKeon interjected.
Gauci nodded: "You need to have guts," he added.
So much so, for example, Gauci said that he had introduced a measure that inspectors must go on a site in pairs in order to reduce the risk of corruption and any potential risk to their safety. Thankfully, he says, police assistance only had to be sought around ten times in the last five years.
Employers have an obligation to report a workplace incident to the OHSA when that incident leads to someone having to take a day of sick leave - a stipulation more onerous than European regulations, which uses four days of sick leave as the reporting threshold.
Referring specifically to the death of Jean Paul Sofia, Gauci said that three OHSA officers were on site to begin their investigations, and that the authority had also asked to be present at the magisterial inquiry during the hearing of witnesses, but this request was turned down.
The OHSA's investigations continued, but all those involved on the site invoked their right to silence and refused to answer questions. This created certain limitations for the OHSA, he said.
"Generally speaking, were there lessons to be learned for the authority?" Zammit McKeon asked.
Gauci says that he must be careful not to reveal certain confidential information, but he can say that the role of the OHSA in that incident is extremely limited.
Zammit McKeon stopped him before he can go any further and said that what interests the board is whether, independently from any steps the OHSA has taken against anyone, there is any method in how the OHSA's work can improve.
"The simple answer is no," Gauci said, as the OHSA has already been proactive in initiatives which improve the situation such as with regards to foreign workers and reopening the MCAST course.
One of the problems in the country, he says, is that it is rare that court cases result in effective imprisonment for the offenders, but rather they are given fines of a few hundred euros.
There needs to be a full reform of the law, Gauci said, before adding that no Minister had ever shown any interest in making the necessary changes to the Act governing health and safety itself.
The only politician to show interest, Gauci said, was current Planning Minister Stefan Zrinzo Azzopardi. "I am not a person who gets involved, but it's a fact that he was the first to properly take note of it," Gauci said.
Gauci also spoke of "misunderstandings" which have been created by mistaken perceptions, with the chief one amongst those being the perception that workplace accidents have increased.
Gauci said that while workplace fatalities have - numerically - increased, the number of workplace accidents has not.
This is not the first time that Gauci is making such a statement: Back in 2020, he had told The Malta Independent that the fact that the media was reporting accidents more often gave the wrong perception that more accidents were happening, when in the past more accidents simply went unreported.
Zammit McKeon interrupted Gauci's statement: "So you are saying that even though the number of people working has increased, but officially and unofficially, the proportion of incidents has decreased?"
When it comes to workplace injuries, Gauci said, the number has decreased, but the number of fatalities has increased.
The statistics aren't everything, he said. The numerical value of a fatality in Malta is small: Malta can have 4 fatalities whereas Italy can have 700, but it's the rate that counts.
One must see the increase in fatalities within the context of the growth of the working population: the working population has doubled between 2001 and now while the number of accidents had plateaued, he said.
Gauci said, however, that the bulk of accidents emanate from the construction sector.
"So the problem we have - and if we are true to ourselves, we need to recognise - is in construction. You're in the streets like I am, you see everybody do what they want... so is this a correct picture?" Zammit McKeon asked.
There are no simple answers, Gauci replied.
Gauci will be departing his post in two months as he will be retiring.
"Are you going to retire with serenity with what you've done?" Zammit McKeon asked.
"Yes, I've always worked and acted with integrity, and I've always given what I thought to be the best advice. I never gave any politically-motivated advice or advice which is against the best interest of health and safety, so I have a clean conscience that I acted correctly. I am not saying that I never made mistakes, but they were not intentional and I always acted to fix them when they happened," Gauci replied.