[WATCH] Foreign workforce is helping to make pensions more sustainable, Edward Scicluna insists

Finance Minister says foreigners are helping make pensions more sustainable

Population growth helps ensure pensions remain sustainable, Finance Minister Edward Scicluna said when asked about the Prime Minister’s blunt warning to those opposed to the foreign influx.

Scicluna said a declining population was unhelpful to ensure pension sustainability. A country growing older like Malta needed to sustain pensions by increasing the retirement age or the national insurance contribution, he explained.

The Finance Minister said the influx of foreigners helped boost the working population, which meant that other solutions to make pensions more sustainable could be avoided.

“I wouldn’t say that with no migrant workers we will have no pensions but we would have to address the issue of sustainability of pensions in another way,” Scicluna said.

Last week, Joseph Muscat insisted in his Sunday speech that the influx of foreign workers helped sustain Malta’s higher standard of living and pensions. “You can’t have the meat without the bone,” he warned as he tackled criticism over the increase in foreigners living and working in Malta.

His blunt remark was criticised by the Opposition, claiming it was symptomatic of a government whose only plan was to use population growth as an economic driver. 

A proposal to import foreign workers to ensure pensions remained sustainable had been made almost a decade ago by the Pensions Working Group that was tasked to study the situation and come up with measures to address the adequacy and sustainability of pensions.

The Finance Minister, who was fielding questions from journalists after a meeting with his Italian counterpart, said foreign workers put the wind in the sails of the Maltese pensions system.

“An increasing population is helpful for sustainability. Since the economy is growing, and is bringing an influx of foreign workers, our population is rising. Therefore, this changes our outlook on pensions. It makes them more sustainable,” Scicluna underscored.

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