On the same day that the National Statistics Office (NSO) announced that Malta's population has now surpassed 574,000 people - with one in every three people in Malta now being a foreigner - the government, coincidentally, remembered that in January it had promised to change the rules on how foreign workers can enter Malta, and in a press conference it announced that it would begin implementing the measures of the Malta Labour Migration Policy starting next month, the Nationalist Party said Friday.

This is nothing but confirmation of the panic within the Labour Government, after it continued to increase Malta's population without a plan and with no long-term vision, resorting to knee-jerk reactions and lacking any clear economic direction, the PN said in a statement signed by Ivan Castillo and Darren Carabott.

The government failed to mention that the problem of uncontrolled population growth is a problem of its own making - and one which it has no idea how to solve, beyond marketing exercises and press conferences.
After 13 years of pushing an economic model based on quantity over quality, the Labour Government now finds itself trapped in a social reality it has no control over: overstretched infrastructure, health and education sectors that are failing to cope, and gridlocked traffic.

The PN said that to this day, the government has still not published the Labour Market Research Study, which has been kept hidden for months, and on which decisions concerning the entry of thousands of workers over the past 13 years were supposedly based.

In contrast, the PN said it has solutions for this sector, which is why it launched a policy document containing measures built on a serious, sustainable immigration policy rooted in a clear economic vision. The PN believes that policy on foreign workers should form part of a wider vision of where we want to go as a country, not as a populist reaction to today's statistics.

There is a need for a policy on the entry of foreign workers into our country that is based on a new economic model: one that grows the economy not through increased population, but through a model that delivers quality growth, creating initiatives and investments that yield more without placing pressure through increased demand for third-country workers.

In its proposals, the PN urges that labour market immigration should be tied to a long-term economic plan, identifying the sectors where workers are genuinely needed, and through a system that attracts individuals with skills that add real value to our economy. The PN wants every policy in this area to be based on clear studies, not on convenience or perception.

The PN said it also believes that with a consultation period that lasted only 32 days, no serious consultation process took place on the Government's part. The period for receiving feedback on the consultation document published in January ended on the 9th of February. It is clear that the Government is in a panic, having waited until July and for yesterday's NSO figures to come out before taking action after six months.

Malta needs a migration policy that is structured, fair, and transparent. And the PN is committed to continuing to present concrete solutions that make sense for the Maltese and Gozitans. Because Malta deserves a policy with long-term vision, not a government lost in U-turns and knee-jerk reactions.