Nearly half of the Maltese population agrees with capping the number of foreign workers

Nearly half of the population is favour in favour of capping the number of foreign workers in Malta.

A Polar survey for newspaper Illum revealed that 49.7% of the Maltese population feel the number of foreign nationals working in the country should be capped at a certain amount.

29.2% do not agree on a quota, while the remaining 21% do not have an opinion on the issue.

Last January, Finance Minister Clyde Caruana had asked stakeholders whether the time was ripe to introduce quotas for permits for foreign workers. He had said that salaries increased over the past years but there were realities that saw some leaping forward much more than others.

Caruana was the mastermind in 2014 of government’s employment policy that sought rapid economic expansion through targeted fiscal and social measures, including the introduction of free childcare, the tapering of social benefits and the importation of foreign labour.

Middle aged people (51-65) were most in favour of introducing capping on foreign labourers at 50.9%. 22% do not agree, while 27% have no opinion on the issue.

The 65 years or older age gap had the lowest percentage of responders who do not agree with capping at just only 16.5%. 48.8% were in favour.

On the other hand, younger people voiced the greatest opposition to the capping of foreign workers, with 43.8% saying they do not agree, while 39.6% said they agree. 16.4% had no opinion on the subject.

Looking at the educational background of respondents, 56% of people with a secondary education said they agree with capping, sharing the same views of 52% of people with a post-secondary education.

The largest opposition (46.4%) to capping of foreign workers came from people with a tertiary education. 39.5% agreed with limiting foreign labourers, while 14% said they do not have an opinion.

Dissecting the numbers according to voter preference, 48.4% of those who voted Labour in the last general election said they agreed.

However, 53% of Nationalist voters agreed with the capping, while no Alternattiva Demokratika voter said they agreed.

43.3% of people who did not vote in the last general election said they agreed with limiting the number of foreign workers in Malta.