The collective agreement of public service employees can be considered as the only agreement at the sectoral level and has about 32,000 employees. Collective bargaining in Malta takes place mainly at the enterprise level. The latter are entities where the State is a majority shareholder and legally independent bodies employing some 11,000 employees, all covered by enterprise-level agreements, and the private sector, which employs some 125,000 people. According to a report by the Maltese Central Bank, results of the 2014 Wage Dynamics Network for Malta, about 23% of private sector workers were covered by a collective agreement in 2013. An estimate based on these criteria would indicate that 45% of Maltese public sector employees covered by a collective agreement are employed, while employees covered by a collective agreement at the enterprise level represent the remaining 55%. No level can be considered a predominant level, the level of enterprise being the most important level of negotiations in Malta. Within the public sector, the public administration collective agreement unit is specifically responsible for coordinating wage changes in this sector. The Public Service Personal Welfare and Welfare Branch is adopting a Personnel Assistance Program (PSE) to assist public servants with personal, emotional and/or behavioural problems that compromise their work-life balance. Such an initiative shows that awareness of mental well-being in the workplace is increasingly important, which is important given that the OHSA estimates that work-related stress contributes to half of workers` absenteeism (Times of Malta, 2013). Today, a new collective agreement has been signed for public service employees.
This is the fifth collective agreement for public servants, but the first for an eight-year period. The goal is to ensure greater stability, while the public administration continues to implement the necessary changes, invest in human resources and provide quality service. The new agreement amounts to about 30,000 employees and represents an effort of 17 million euros for 2017 and will increase to 20.5 million euros by 2024.