Robert Abela is a genius. He’s come-up with a cunning plan.
He’s placated public anger over the massive overpopulation, by announcing he’ll take steps to limit importation of foreign labour. But at the same time he declared “economic growth relies on… foreign workers”. So how did he square that circle?
He attacked “operators whose business model is not based on education and training” but “is based on an unlimited provision of foreign workers and invest nothing in training”. He denounced “slavery-like conditions” imposed by those “operators”. “We will stand up to the operators who aren’t willing to follow this direction”, he threatened.
But he sneakily added “Government will fully back operators who invest in training”.
Just days later Ozo group, co-owned by the Zammit Tabonas pompously declared that “we are committed to implementing… comprehensive training programmes”. Ozo group is one of those “operators” importing thousands of third country nationals. Labour is paying them around €2 million per month to provide 700 mostly low paid workers to Wasteserv. In just ten months Labour paid Ozo €18.5 million out of taxes. It just so happened that barely days after Abela attacked operators imposing “slavery-like conditions”, Ozo group announced a partnership with Slave-Free Alliance to prevent “modern slavery within its operation”. What a co-incidence.
Abela has no intention of limiting foreign workers. He’s intending to “fully back operators who invest in training”. And guess who those operators might be - yes, Zammit Tabona’s Ozo group.
Ozo Group CEO Fabio Muscat welcomed Abela’s proposed “regulations for temping agencies”. “These regulations will benefit the market and will help weed out abuses,” he commented. What he really meant is that Labour will help kill their competition. Abela actually promised to “stand up to operators” who don’t toe the line. Only operators approved by Labour will survive - operators like Ozo. Because who better than Ozo to do Labour’s bidding.
Ozo group’s CEO conveniently echoed Abela’s mantra. “It is clear that our economy needs foreign workers, without these human resources not only our hospitality industry but our healthcare and other necessary services would grind to a halt”.
Ozo group even took Pearl Agius, Miriam Dalli’s canvasser and ONE journalist, off Wasteserv’s books and employed her themselves. She’s one of the 700 staff members employed by Ozo and deployed to Wasteserv . Pearl Agius was employed by Wasteserv as a lawyer before she even had her warrant to practice. That wasn’t because Agius is brilliant or excelled at her Law degree. Now she’s been shifted onto Ozo’s payroll. She’s obviously not one of the hundreds of low paid third country nationals. How much of our money Ozo group is paying her is top secret. Ozo’s CEO refused to divulge what Agius is paid. Conveniently Wasteserv’s CEO Richard Bilocca claimed he cannot publish her contract because Wasteserv doesn’t employ her, Ozo does. And because she’s an Ozo employee she can spend her time at ONE’s newsroom, instead of Wasteserv.
Besides, the co-owner of Ozo group pumped thousands of euro in donations to Abela’s Labour party. Zammit Tabona even paid disgraced former Prime-minister Joseph Muscat tens of thousands of euro. The first payment reached Muscat’s account within 3 months of his humiliating ousting.
No wonder Joseph Muscat keeps pushing the lie that “if you don’t want more foreigners, say goodbye to your pension”. No wonder he kept telling unions that foreigners were “indispensable”.
The truth is that Labour pushed 1,100 “longterm unemployed” onto the GWU run Community Workers Scheme. The GWU is getting €109 million to pay those 1,100 workers a minimum wage and make millions off the scheme. The GWU was meant to run the scheme as a non-profit foundation. Instead it set up its own private company, District Operations, to run it. One of the directors of that company is the GWU’s own Josef Bugeja. He was at the Ozo group event announcing that the GWU signed a new collective agreement with Ozo group.
In 2018, Bugeja’s company filed accounts at the Malta Business registry showing a suspicious 1.2million euro in vague “administration expenses”. That year, directors’ remuneration increased from 16,714 euro to 46,600 euro. Josef Bugeja, as one of those directors, made money off the taxpayer and off those workers paid minimum wages.
Bugeja declared at the Ozo group event that the group’s affiliation with Slave-Free Alliance was “an example for all players in the service industry”. It should also be an example for the GWU, condemned by the Archbishop for exploiting workers on that scheme.
Labour didn’t need that scheme. It didn’t need Ozo group to supply 700 workers to Wasteserv. It could easily have deployed those 1,100 workers on the GWU jobless scheme to Wasteserv and save the taxpayer 1.3 million euro per month it pays the GWU and another 2 million euro per month it pays Ozo group. That’s almost 40 million euro of our money every year.
Even the Bishop of Gozo knows that those workers on the GWU’s jobless scheme won’t be missed. Many of them don’t even go to work or if they do they’re only there for a few minutes before they dash off to carry on with their own private business.
Robert Abela will introduce measures that ensure that Ozo group’s competition is obliterated, enabling him to keep pumping millions of our taxes into Zammit Tabona’s company. In return, Ozo group will keep paying ONE journalists lavish salaries which can be conveniently kept secret from the public. Meanwhile Abela can claim he’s controlling the numbers of foreign workers while doing nothing of the sort.
And everybody wins. Robert Abela wins votes. Ozo group and its owners get richer. ONE journalists get paid with our taxes through Ozo group. And Zammit Tabona donates money to Labour.
The only losers are Ozo’s poorly paid third country nationals doing the dirty work. And all the rest of us funding the whole Ponzi scheme.
Ozo Group's response
Ozo Group responded to the opinion article, saying it is not in the business of abusive employment or cheap labour, and is not dependent on the government for its income.
Ozo Group's full response below:
"With reference to the article by Kevin Cassar published on October 22nd, the following clarifications must be made:
1. Ozo Group has been investing in training for almost 10 years. In 2014, we founded the Ozo Academy, the first private hospitality school on the island. The school is accredited and recognised by NCFHE and all courses are MQRIC certified. Ozo does not in any way charge incoming workers, and instead pays them to attend training.
2. Our commitment to good conditions for our workers is also not a recent phenomenon. In 2016, we signed the first private collective agreement of our industry, hand-in-hand with General Workers Union. We recently updated and renewed this collective agreement guaranteeing fair pay above minimum wage, additional allowances, and three days of leave for personal losses, including the loss of an unborn child.
3. The fact that we recently also qualified to become members of the internationally-reputable Slave-Free Alliance is testament to our commitment to our workers. Membership of this alliance requires a long and continuous process of due diligence that keeps us accountable every single day.
4. All our workers are Ozo employees. We source and employ them directly ourselves. Ozo is not an agent, nor does it use agents in recruiting people to work in Malta. Ozo is also not a temping agency.
5. The vast majority of Ozo's work is within the private sector. One of the company's few public contracts is the Wasteserv one. The idea to outsource staffing at Wasteserv was made around 20 years ago, and has been maintained through various tenders and negotiated procedures issued along the years and won by different bidders because of the cost-benefit to government.
6. An overwhelming 98% of the staff employed for this Wasteserv contract are Maltese nationals, not third-country nationals. The amount paid monthly by government to Ozo includes the salaries of 865 employees. Ozo makes a small (and publicly documented) margin of 5% to manage the recruitment, deployment, payroll and discipline of these employees, as per the requirements of the competitive tender which was won by Ozo.
7. Employees at Wasteserv are all under a collective agreement agreed between Wasteserv and UHM before Ozo was awarded the tender. Ozo does not determine the salaries of employees. Salaries and grades have been established years ago.
We hope this clarifies that Ozo is not in the business of abusive employment or cheap labour, and is not dependent on the government for its income."