[WATCH] ‘All will be revealed about Air Malta and its future when negotiations are finished,’ Caruana says

Government talks over Air Malta with the European Commission are still ongoing and all details on the airline’s future will be revealed once discussions are finished, Finance Minister Clyde Caruana said on Monday.

“I hope that we can soon revealed the results of these discussions, but as I have been saying, I can only issue the government’s position on Air Malta once deliberations are concluded,” he told the press.

Responding to journalists’ questions after a Labour press conference, he explained that exchanges regarding information requests between the government and the Commission are ongoing and that the government will be sending information regarding the airline next week.

Caruana assured the media that once negotiations have ended, they will be notified of all changes and developments concerning Air Malta

In April, Air Malta Executive Chairman, David Curmi confirmed that the airline will be replaced by the end of this year, following the rejection of a government request to inject millions of euro into the company.

In 2021, Clyde Caruana had stated that without permission for state aid from Brussels, “Air Malta will not live.”

Regarding layoffs in Air Malta, Curmi had specified that 300 employees would be sacked, and that they would have the opportunity to apply for work in the new airline.

This is part of a long process of restructuring within the national airline, which saw the introduction of various measures such as a voluntary employee transfer scheme to cut Air Malta’s workforce in half. This measure alone cost the government more than €60 million in 2022.