The proposal to introduce mandatory trade union membership has garnered several polarising opinions since its inclusion in the government's electoral manifesto for the 2022 general election. The General Workers Union and UĦM Voice of the Workers were both in favour of this electoral promise, while employer bodies such as the Malta Employers Association and the Malta Chamber of Commerce had positioned themselves firmly against the implementation of this idea.

While the Malta Employers and the Malta Chamber reacted positively to the government's change of position, after parliamentary secretary Andy Ellul said that pursuing mandatory union membership is not "legally advisable", the trade unions were not so content with the announcement.

Trade unions disappointed, urge government to reconsider position

The General Workers' Union urged the government to reconsider its position, "not for political reasons, but because it is a matter of national interest".

"The government's shift in position is a significant missed opportunity to implement a structural solution to combat worker exploitation, a reality confirmed by numerous recent court cases involving platform workers and other vulnerable employees," the GWU said.

The union added that the government's change in heart also "fails to address the inherent unfairness of the 'free rider' phenomenon, where individuals benefit from hard-won collective agreements without contributing to the resources required to negotiate and uphold them".

The GWU maintained its position calling for automatic union enrolment with an opt-out provision for all members of the workforce, as well as including a nominal fee for non-members benefitting from collective agreements.

The GWU stated that it "fundamentally" disagrees with the assertion that the model it is pushing for is not legally advisable - it argued that its proposal "was never about 'mandatory' membership in a coercive sense".

Parliamentary secretary Ellul told The Malta Independent on Sunday that "according to the advice [the government] is receiving, legally, it is not advisable for us to promote mandatory union membership".

The GWU said that its proposal is designed to be "constitutionally sound"; the scope of the GWU's proposal is centred around establishing a "default protective framework for all workers, while explicitly respecting an individual's right to opt-out", the union said.

"The true legal challenge lies not in implementing this system, but in failing to address the systemic issues it is designed to solve," the GWU stated.

The GWU added that "simple 'membership drives' or awareness campaigns are not a sufficient substitute for a structural mechanism", adding that "locally and internationally has shown that such campaigns yield only marginal, temporary increases in union density". Furthermore, it observed that this approach will not help Malta achieve the "significant and permanent increase in collective bargaining coverage" the country needs.

The GWU concluded that its goal "is not to eliminate choice, but to ensure the system's default setting is one of protection and fairness".

"We remain convinced that a model of automatic enrolment with an opt-out is the most viable way to protect the vulnerable, ensure compliance with EU directives, and guarantee the long-term sustainability of decent work in Malta," the GWU said, adding that it is ready to engage in talks to put its mandatory unionisation proposal back on the cards.

In this sense, the GWU said that this debate should be framed by the evidence at hand, rather than through the subject's polarising nature. Noting that the strong opinions generated in this discussion manifests its importance, the GWU said that "a mature democracy does not shy away from complex issues; it engages with them through evidence-based dialogue".

The UĦM told this newsroom that the introduction of mandatory union membership "was not just a one-off electoral pledge, but a repeated commitment in several Labour Party manifestos over the years".

UĦM said that had it been undertaken in the past, several related issues, such as the need to establish a Low Wage Commission, could have been avoided. It argued that this Commission was only set up once it became apparent that "low-income workers were being left behind in terms of wages, forcing the government to step in" and that "if these workers had been unionised, there would have been no need for such intervention". The union added that "if we do not change course, this scenario will continue to repeat itself every few years, with the commission proposing minor increases - perhaps €2 or so - for those workers lagging behind."

It also expressed concern towards "one of the most significant problems in the Maltese labour market" that remains: the situation of around 15,000 contractor employees working for private companies providing services to government or public entities and the difficulty in ensuring that they enjoy the same conditions as their public sector counterparts for the same duties. UĦM believes that this problem "would never have arisen in the first place if these contractor employees had been unionised", since they would have been safeguarded by collective agreements.

UĦM concluded by saying that "these problems would have been nipped in the bud" had all these employees been covered by collective agreements. This would have prevented this "huge headache" for unions and the public service, it said.

Malta Employers 'delighted that common sense seems to be prevailing'

The Malta Employers declared that it is "delighted that common sense seems to be prevailing" upon reading about this development. It augured that it will no longer need to use its resources and "precious time" to oppose this measure "under the mandatory guise and any other different name or title it may be given from here on".

"The decision to abandon any plan of introducing mandatory union membership is definitely the right one because no one - not even the State - should interfere with this sacred right," the Malta Employers stated.

The Malta Chamber of Commerce told this newsroom that their position has not changed since publishing a shared statement with the Malta Employers, the Chamber of SMEs, and the Malta Hotel and Restaurants Association (MHRA) in October last year: "that membership or non-membership in a trade union is an individual choice" and that "neither government, nor employers, nor unions should ever force membership or non-membership on employees".

In October 2024, these organisations noted their position against mandatory union membership to be unwavering and firmly rejected, on principle, all models of mandatory unionisation previously mentioned by Parliamentary secretary Ellul.

The Malta Chamber said that this principle is protected by the Constitution of Malta and international conventions like the United Nations Charter for Human Rights, as well as the European Convention on Human Rights.

The Malta Employers declared that it has always been "deeply convinced" that the proposal to eventually introduce mandatory trade union membership, as was worded, "could not have materialised". This organisation said that what was proposed "was tantamount to interfering with the free will of people and their right of association and disassociation".

"We stand firm with the principle that the decision on whether to join a trade union or otherwise is solely of the individual employee, with no coercion from the employer, unions or government," the Malta Employers added.

The Malta Employers said that it never was, and never will be, against the notion of trade union membership - it is only, even if "vehemently", against making such membership being mandatory. Hence, it said that given its track record of collaborating with unions and its maintained "excellent working relationships" to prove this, it is not against the State supporting trade unions and social partners to build and enhance their capacities further.

It added that there is no need to make trade union membership mandatory for all members of the workforce, noting that "there is nothing stopping anyone from joining a union" and that "frequent media reports about groups of workers joining a union en masse, even recently, are testament to this".

The Malta Employers feared that through the implementation of mandatory union membership, "people would use a fundamental right to associate or disassociate themselves from something" when this right should not be interfered with.

It continued that enacting this electoral pledge "would have needlessly upset the process of union representation, recognition and collective bargaining", stating that "this could have happened when people who have no interest or place in being part of something are suddenly called to vote". The employer body said that this would have caused more harm than good, "possibly contributing to deterioration in social dialogue and in industrial relations" during a period of healthy relations and a climate of industrial peace.